


sleepy little county

by living_to_read



Series: Commish gordon [1]
Category: Batman (Movies - Nolan)
Genre: Altenate Universe, DC comics - Freeform, F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2011-01-02
Updated: 2012-10-02
Packaged: 2017-10-14 08:17:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 26
Words: 64,392
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/147232
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/living_to_read/pseuds/living_to_read
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gotham is a sleepy little county where nothing ever happens. Then Bruce Wayne moves in and nothing is the same anymore.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> NC-17 (OVER ALL). Jim/Bruce + others. This story has a plot running. There will be sex, Angst and UST, but not always in the same chapters.

“FUCK!”  
Bruce Wayne tripped over a chunk of rock and sprained his ankle. He stumbled, swore and pressed on, limping.  
Compared to the wreckage his life was lately, he thought, this was nothing, but it pissed him off nonetheless. Life’s little insults, piled up one on top of another, tended to do that to him.  
He was good with major catastrophes. He had been accustomed to them since he was eight years old, but little things like his maternal grandparents' very, very old car, dead as a dodo on the side of a damn country road, on the way to the tumbled-down home that was all that remained of the Wayne fortune;that was just plain too much to bear.  
He cursed some more that bastard, fate, and the old Oldsmobile, hanging off the edge of the road a good half mile behind him, and then he took a couple of very long breaths, set his sights forward again and decided he'd whined enough for the day. He had to keep putting one foot in front of the other and move on, no matter how many curve balls were coming his way. He had to keep fighting, both for himself and for the kids. It didn't matter if he was broke, robbed of his whole fortune by his father's partner and his wife, he couldn't delude the kids. He'd promised Dick and Tim they were not going to go back to the institute, and he was going to keep that promise come hell or high water.

Calmer, he looked around and took in the view of Gotham's countryside around him. It was nice. Not spectacular, or breathtaking, or wild, but gentle and peaceful like Vermont, but without the mountains. The fields all around were an exhibition of green, young corn and oats, alfalfa and grass. Occasional spots of trees broke the monotony of farm fields. To the south, the fields sloped down to the Gotham Creek, the meandering puddle of water that named both the nearest town and the whole county. The banks were steep, the creek itself shallow and muddy, probably no more than twenty feet across.  
All in all, Bruce conceded, it wasn't so bad. He could grow accustomed to it, in a century or two.

Then it started raining, and Bruce cursed again under his breath. He tried to limp a little faster, but he was soaked to the bones in no time, and he was at least a mile from home.  
Selina would have loved seeing him reduced to this, he thought. Limping down the road from that little point in the map the locals called town (but a city-dweller would have called a block or a quarter) toward a house as big as the guest bathroom of the penthouse he used to live in.  
He could picture her, the bitch, perfect and gorgeous, beautiful and sexy as all the Pussycat Dolls put together, laughing at his expense, while wasting away all the money she had managed to steal before Morris Grant (good old uncle Morris, may the devil take him too) stole all the rest.

The only satisfaction was that in their frenzy Selina and Morris had forgotten to look into his grandparents'(or better, grandmother; Grandpa Kane wouldn't have left to Wayne a bucket to piss in) will, leaving him with an admittedly very small but livable ranch and a few, not much but better than nothing, grand in Gotham's bank account. They also missed the fact that, even if nobody knew, Alfred was the legitimate owner of the penthouse since the death of Bruce's parents, and so a couple million bucks had escaped their greed.  
Limping on his still hurting ankle and soaked to the bone, Bruce wondered once again if he had done the right thing, refusing Alfred's offer to stay in the penthouse with the kids 'til they managed to get their hands on Grant and the money, which could have meant like forever.  
He'd been tempted, that's for sure, but it would have been unfair to Alfred... and truth be told, Dick and Tim were having a blast, working on the remodeling of the ranch. To say they were happier now than when they were in the city was a far cry from the truth, but they seemed to face the whole new situation a lot better than him. They simply squared their shoulders, soldiered up and moved along dragging him with them. God bless them for that.  
As Dick had said to him, he and Tim had both been rich for a lot less time than Bruce, so losing that status wasn't such a big deal. And they'd hated Selina with a passion and were more than happy to be rid of the bitchy barracuda from Hell. They were sure Alfred was going to find both Selina and Morris and kick their asses as the good old SAS he was, so it was just a temporary situation.  
Bruce would have payed to have just a bit of Dick and Tim optimism, but he wasn't sure he could afford it. Then he imagined their faces when he was going to march in the living room, looking like a wet stray dog, and once again he thought that their laughs were worth the effort.

On the south side of the road, a freshly laid gravel drive led across the field to the construction site of what was being touted as the finest resort south of the city. The resort was in a stage of construction that made it look like nothing more than a big, ugly skeleton, but Bruce had seen the sketches of the finished product, and he could say with certainty that the resort was going to be a big and vulgar abomination in the middle of nothing, doomed to be as tasteless as the man who was building it: Jack Napier.

He groaned as he caught sight of Napier’s car parked near the rusting white trailer that served as office for the construction site. When it came to neighborhood etiquette, Napier was to Bruce what a snake could be for a mongoose.  
Jack Napier was kingpin around Gotham. He’d made his money, scratching his way up from the bottom rung of the ladder. His journey from poverty to prosperity had left him with a survival-of-the-fittest mentality that, in his opinion, allowed him to lord it over anyone he thought inferior to him, genetically or financially—which meant most everyone in Gotham.  
He hated Bruce's grandparents because they never buckled to his pressures to sell the ranch; hated Bruce's mother because she'd preferred the rich doctor from the city to him almost three decades ago; and hated Bruce because he was useless to him now that he was poor and a menace to him if he got rich again, which was improbable but not impossible.  
The fact that Bruce had refused to sell the farm too didn't help to ease the everlasting feud, but Bruce hadn't lost sleep over it, and he was sure he wasn't going to in the future.  
Nonetheless, he could have used a ride home at the moment, even if it meant talking with the king of the hill, so he walked into the construction site and looked around to see if the big SOB was around.  
His heart leaped into his throat as his gaze caught on the figure of the man sitting in the front seat of his expensive car.  
Jack Napier was a mean SOB, but that didn't mean he deserved to have his throat slit open from ear to ear.


	2. Chapter 2

Jim Gordon slid his open mouth across his partner’s belly upward to the underside of her right breast, tickling it with his graying, thick mustache.   
His tongue flicked out to tease her nipple, leaving a wet trail on her skin. He blew softly across the moistened spot, then slowly drew her distended nipple into his mouth and sucked. He enjoyed the taste of her skin and the purr coming from her mouth. He liked the fact he was still able to get that out of a woman. His ego and self-esteem rejoiced from that, even if after the divorce Jim had wholly embraced the idea of eternal bachelorhood and the concept of “no strings attached”.

He had devoted his life to a woman already, and once had been plenty. While he had liked domestic life well enough and loved Babs and Jim Jr with every fiber of his body, he hadn’t liked it well enough to risk again experiencing the kind of pain Barbara had dealt him when she’d decided she'd had enough of him. The pain of betrayal and rejection that, after all these years, still cut at him in unguarded moments.   
He had given Barbara his heart, when he’d been too weak and vulnerable to know better; too emotionally shaken by his tour in Iraq and in the Balkans to believe that she wouldn’t love him forever; too stubborn to admit that they were ill matched; and too optimistic to believe that their problems were going to get fixed, when the knee' injury forced him to come home from Sarajevo. The knee had never recovered well enough, and it had forced him to leave the US marine corp. Now it gave him problems every time the weather changed, but it was nothing compared to the failure of his marriage. He'd told himself over and over that it was simply because he hated to fail.   
Anyway, Barbara had given his heart back to him without apology or any sign of regret. And he had come back home to Gotham with a bitter lesson learned: Love was treacherous, and he had no intention of traveling that road again.   
Besides, it was easier being single. He had no expectations to live up to but his own, no definition of success, failure, wealth, or worthiness, but his own. He was content with his position as sheriff of Gotham County, where nothing much ever happened, and he was free to take a day off now and again to go fishing with Jim Jr, or train Bab's softball or soccer's team.   
He was content with his quiet, well-ordered life and his small farm outside of Gotham.   
He was content to have the kids with him every odd week and just on the other side of town, which meant 20 minutes away walking very slowly, the rest of the time.  
He was less content to keep falling into bed with Barbara every time she had nothing better to aim at, or was simply in the mood for a good, uncomplicated fuck, but the arrangement was working well enough for both of them.   
Barbara was a public prosecutor in Gotham county, and she aimed for a position in the Governor's office, so she didn't want her name attached too close to some country boy, and since she had a lot of reasons and two kids to justify meeting the local sheriff, who also was her ex husband, nobody suspected anything.   
In the exchange, Jim was having full access to his kids, a friendly relationship with his ex wife and good, honest, satisfying sex with none of the usual cumbersome emotional baggage attached.   
And if he kept repeating it over and over, he'd manage to start to believe it sooner or later.

Not that he was still in love with Barbara. That had gone sour a long time ago. Nowadays he didn’t agree with her politic agenda, and her ambition left a bitter taste in his mouth, but they were still good in bed, and, in his opinion, he was too weak and too lazy to turn his back to a good lay.

“Oh, Jim, please,” Barbara whispered in the breathless voice she used when she wanted something really badly.

“In a hurry tonight?” he murmured dryly.

“Just hungry,” she said, licking her lips. “The Hammersby trial starts tomorrow.”

A slow smile curve the edges of Jim’s mustache. Barbara was never better in bed than the night before the start of a big case. The adrenaline, he knew, was for her job, for the excitement of the battle, not for him. But he benefited just the same.

“How do you want it?” he whispered against her lips, easing himself just barely inside her.

“Hard and fast,” she gasped, her eyes glittering with reckless excitement as she stared up at him. “Really hard.”   
Jim groaned as he settled his mouth over hers. He was in for one hell of an evening.

Barbara was as hot and unrestrained in bed as she was cool and reserved in her professional world. The contrast never failed to give Jim a little extra rush when he was inside her. When he wasn’t, it only made him acutely aware that his ex was a consummate actress and a hypocrite, which wasn't a good thing to think about the mother of his children. But at the moment he didn’t give a damn. He heaved against her one final time and came in a hot rush of satisfaction.

The satisfaction would be short-lived. It always was. There was that burst, that instant when his body reached its climax, that was sweet and good, but it always fell short of what some other part of him wanted. He would be physically sated. Barbara never failed him that way. His body never failed him that way. And he told himself that was all he wanted—the physical release.   
But as he eased himself down on top of her, he couldn’t quite escape the faint hollow feeling in his gut. In that single unguarded moment, when a man was at his weakest, he couldn’t quite deny the need. He wouldn’t name it, wouldn’t make a move to do anything about it, wouldn’t see it as anything other than a weakness, but he couldn’t deny it was there.

“You screw good for an old man.” Barbara's voice, still breathless in the afterglow, cut through Jim’s moment of introspection like a razor.   
He flashed her a grin that was just short of being cold. “Happy to oblige, ma'am,” he drawled with biting sarcasm.   
Barbara gave a throaty chuckle. She enjoyed upsetting him as much as she enjoyed screwing with him, and she seemed to get an extra kick when she was sure to hit a nerve.   
Her perfectly manicured fingers skated down Jim’s back to his buttocks. She squeezed his ass and arched up beneath him, her body tightening around his cock, enticing him to hardness again.

“In for a rerun before you go, Sheriff Gordon?” Barbara asked, her eyelids drooping to half-mast as she savored the sensation of him swelling inside her.   
She usually wanted him out of the house as soon as they'd finished, claiming it would confuse Babs and Jim Jr to find him there in the morning, as if the kids didn't know why dad's car was parked on the other side of the road, once or twice a week, more or less an hour after their bed time. Babs had already come this close to telling him to stop allowing mom to use him like a rag and go find the happiness he deserved, but Babs was partial; she always took his side when it came to family matters.

“You betcha!” Jim moved against her, his eyes narrowed, mouth set in a grim line, his internalized anger driving his second round more than a real need to go off again.  
No, he didn’t like Barbara anymore, but he liked what she did for him. She kept him sexually appeased and emotionally alert, and that, he insisted, was all he really needed.

On the chrome-and-glass stand beside the bed a cell phone went off.

“Dammit!”

“Shit!”

“Yours or mine?” Barbara asked, all business in the blink of an eye.   
Jim disengaged, and she scrambled out from under him and rose up on her knees, scraping her tumbled bangs out of her eyes as she reached toward the stand.   
“Mine,” Jim barked.   
He swung his legs over the side of the bed and reached for the phone. “This had better be nothing short of murder.”   
Barbara chuckled. “Murder in Gotham County. That’ll be the day. People down there die of boredom, not mayhem.”   
Jim growled in reply, a sound that might have been either agreement or rebuttal, but was in any event unpleasant.   
“Renee, this is my night off,” he snarled into the mouthpiece through gritted teeth, annoyance ringing in his every word.   
The woman on the other end of the line completely disregarded his tone of voice, and the threat implicit in it, and rushed eagerly into her news, as breathless as if she’d just run a mile to get to the phone.   
“Sheriff, you’re not going to believe this. Someone’s gone and killed Jack Napier.”

“Killed?” Jim murmured, his annoyance jelling into a cold lump in his stomach. He straightened his spine and squared his broad shoulders, coming unconsciously to attention. He drove a hand into his hair, slicking it back from his forehead. “You mean he died. He had a heart attack or something.”

“Oh, no. I wish that was what I meant, but Bullock was very clear. He said killed.”   
Killed. Murdered. Christ. There hadn’t been a murder in the county in decades. The idea stunned him, numbed him like a blow between the eyes. With an effort he cut a narrow line through the haze in his brain and forced his mind to function in its official capacity.   
“How?”   
Renee Montoya's voice dropped to a near whisper, full of anxiety. “His throat was cut. Harvey said his throat had been opened... from ear to ear.”


	3. Chapter 3

Sheriff Gordon took the northern route, paying no attention to the lush farmland that usually had the power to soothe his nerves, turned right on Post Road and finally drove his black and blue patrol car into the driveway of the Gotham resort.   
He gunned the engine and cursed loudly. A crowd had already gathered, and he had to swerve off onto the rutted, hard-packed dirt to find a place to park among the cars and TV station news vans.  
He climbed down out of the truck and strode across the uneven ground of the construction site, pain biting into his bum left knee with every step, telling him better than any meteorologist that there was another bad storm brewing.   
He ignored the pain and glared, from above his bone framed glasses, at the people who had come to catch a glimpse of death.

Someone had killed Jack Napier. No matter how many times he replayed the message in his head, it still didn’t seem real to him.   
He hadn’t been very fond of the man, no one had, but he wouldn’t have wished him dead, and he couldn’t think of anyone who would have — not sincerely enough to carry it through.   
Napier was (had been) a bully of a man who liked to throw his weight and money around, pissing off a lot of people, but those weren’t reasons enough to kill him.

Already the scene of the crime looked like a three-ring circus. Every bloke in the county with a police scanner had come to gawk.   
Three black-and-blue Gotham County cruisers were parked at improbable angles around Napier's Lincoln. The deputies stood guard around the fringes of the scene, nervously discouraging onlookers from getting too close.   
At a glance, Jim estimated nearly fifty people in attendance, and about half of them were headed his way with bright eyes, raised voices, and cameras. Reporters.   
Holy Christ. As a life-form, he ranked them slightly above child molesters. They would ask stupid, obvious questions and expect answers he couldn’t possibly give.

“Sheriff Gordon, does this come as a shock?”

“Sheriff, did he have any enemies?”

“Do you have any suspects?”

“Were there any witnesses?”

Jim ignored the questions being hurled at him from all sides, knowing that if he paused, if he offered one sentence in answer and gave them an opening, they would close on him like sharks.   
Chief Deputy Harvey Bullock shouldered aside two of the reporters and reached him first. Bullock was a short, stocky, middle-aged man with a receding hairline, perpetually worried eyes and the beginnings of a paunch that strained the buttons of his uniform shirt and spilled over the waistband of his black trousers. His khaki uniform shirt was sweat-stained, and dust streaked his black trousers. He cracked his knuckles one at a time as he fell into step with Gordon.

“Jeez, boss, we thought you’d never get here.”

“Who found Napier?” Jim demanded in a low voice.

“The city boy who moved into the old Kanes place. That Wayne fellow.” He shook his head like a man who’d been dazed. “ He's going to be trouble, Jim...”

Jim felt the urge to ask why, but he was distracted by the sound of helicopter blades beating the air. As he glanced up, a spotlight poured down, dazzling them almost to blindness.   
Squinting, Jim managed to catch a glimpse of the letters of a television station emblazoned across the side of the chopper. For a moment he considered pulling out his gun and taking down the light and the chopper, but he decided not to. Too many witnesses to manage it, and make it pass for an accident.

“Bloody hell,” he snapped. “Don’t they have enough crime of their own to report on?”

He didn’t wait for an answer from Bullock, but pushed his way past another half-dozen people, all barking for his attention. Renee Montoya, his youngest rookie deputy, was clearly relieved to see him and eagerly stepped back to let him into the circle of calm that had been established around the crime scene.   
“Evening, Sheriff,” she said, nodding and swallowing nervously. Her thin, perpetually brooding face, gleaming with sweat, looked a lot paler than her usual tanned complexion.

“Hell of a way to spend the evening, huh, Renee?”

Montoya couldn’t quite muster a smile. At twenty-three, death was something she had seen rarely, and this, her first murder, was gory. She shuddered at the thought as her supper threatened a return trip from her stomach. She swallowed hard and turned another shade of pale.   
Jim gave her an encouraging pat on the shoulder and forced himself to take another step toward the crime scene.   
He didn’t blame the girl for being rattled. He wasn’t exactly looking forward to this himself.   
Death was never pretty, and it was never pleasant. He’d seen enough of it during his time in the marines, and he had wished with all his heart to avoid seeing it again as long as he lived.   
He'd been pretty sure he'd managed to fulfill that desire by moving to Gotham county, but now it looked like the dream was over.   
Murder didn’t belong here. People in Gotham didn’t lock their doors. They left their keys in their cars. They never hesitated to stop to help a stranger. Murder was something to read about in the papers. It was something that occasionally shocked everyone in the nearest “big” town.   
Jim felt like the old Sheriff in that episode of 'Murder, she wrote', the one who after the discovering of the corpse commented to Jessica Fletcher: “A murder? Here in Cabot Cove?”.   
Seeing as from that moment Cabot Cove had had, in comparison, the same killing percentages of cities like NY and LA, Jim really wished that all the likenesses between his little spot on the map and the TV show ended there. He also hoped that the situation wouldn't turn into the canvas of a Stephen King's novel, which also turned sleepy, peaceful places into slaughterhouses where usually the sheriffs were the first to buy it.

Jim’s shoulders rose and fell as he planted his hands at his waist and heaved a sigh. He tried to take in the scene with the eyes of a police officer, objective and observant, but he couldn’t fend off the initial shock of seeing a dead man and knowing another human being had caused that death. The tremors reached the very bedrock of his life. His face, however, remained impassive as he squatted down beside the body.   
Napier was still inside the car, but there was no way to tell if he had been moved or not.   
With one hand Jim gingerly lifted the man’s chin and took a look.   
The wound was ugly, a deep slash across the throat that revealed more insides than Jim cared to see. He had died quickly, too quickly to have reconciled himself to his fate, Jim thought, tearing his gaze away from the wound.  
Napier hadn’t been a handsome man alive. Somewhere around fifty, he had a long, bony face, thin lips outstretched over too long- always showing teeth that made him look as if he was perpetually grinning and mocking people. He had worn his too- black, to not be dyed, hair slicked back with smelly grease, and his now glassy eyes were too close to each other and angled in a way that made him look on the verge of craziness. Death had not improved him any.

For just a second, Jim could see in his mind’s eye what must have happened the instant the blade had sliced across the man’s throat. His stomach tightened at the sea of blood flowing in his imagination.

“Jesus,” he murmured, letting go of Napier's chin. Rigor mortis had yet to set in, and the body slumped back into place limply.   
“I guess Jack won’t be cheating at poker anymore.” Arnold J. Flass, the county ex-sheriff, and at the moment one of the many deputies, leaned against the back door of Napier's car, his arms folded across his chest. In his senior years, he had finally outgrown the baby face that had plagued him most of his life, and nowadays, he simply looked petulant.

“Good job, Flass,” Jim drawled sardonically. “Dust the car for prints with your butt. The Bureau of Criminal Investigation will love you.”

The deputy made a sour face as he pushed himself away from the Lincoln. “You called the BCI? This is our case, Jim. We don’t need them.”

“Yeah, I can see how professionally you’re handling it,” Jim answered dryly.

“Well, I sure as hell wouldn’t have called in outsiders.”

“It wasn’t your choice, was it?”

“Not this time.”

Jim ground his teeth, biting back a retort. He didn’t need to get into a fight with one of his own deputies in front of the press. He merely stared at Flass.  
A flicker of uneasiness crossed Flass' face, then he turned and swaggered away with his thumbs hooked into his belt.   
Tamping down his temper, Jim moved away from the car, while ostensibly looking for clues, and all the while wondering why Arnold Flass had remained in the force after he’d lost the race for the sheriff’s office. The man could have gone anywhere in the state, gotten a better job, or retired and gotten the hell away from around his ankles.

“Flass says you called in the BCI,” Bullock commented, moving away from the line put in front of the press.

“They’re the experts,” Jim nodded, his voice soft and deadly. He turned his scowl on his chief deputy and ticked his reasons off on his fingers one by one.   
“We’ve got no lab, we’ve got no forensics team, we’ve got no one who has seen a murder anywhere but on television, and I don’t think anyone here has picked up enough from watching CSI to do this right.”

The state Bureau of Criminal Investigation was made of specialists, who had at their central lab all the latest technology for analyzing evidence, and was at the disposal of every law enforcement in the state. It was a sheriff’s decision whether to call them in or not. As far as Jim could see, a country cop would have to have a brain full of corn flakes to leave the BCI out of a murder investigation.

“We’ve never handled a murder. I don’t want to fuck up this.”

Bullock shrugged, raising his hands in surrender. “OK... I'm all for not fucking things up with all those vultures around.”   
Jim’s jaw hardened, and his eyes narrowed as he stared over at Flass, who was barking at the reporters. “Not everybody seems to agree with that.”

“Yeah . . . well . . .” Bullock cracked his knuckles and shuffled his feet. “You know Arnie.”

“Yeah, I know Arnie. He couldn’t find his ass with both his hands and a map, but thinks he can solve a murder on his own.”   
Bullock coughed to conceal a laugh. “What do we do until the BCI guys get here?”

“We don’t touch anything, don’t let anybody else touch anything. They’ll take care of all the photography, the fingerprinting, physical evidence. We just have to stay out of their way and do whatever they ask. They will be here within the hour. ”

“OK, Chief.”

“Where’s the city boy?”

Bullock motioned toward the trailer next to the crime scene. “He was soaking wet when we arrived, and he took shelter in the office. He didn't like us very much for keeping him from going home and changing his clothes...may be still a bit pissed off.”

Jim snorted. “Looks like we've got a Paris Hilton on our hands, huh? Bring him over here.”


	4. Chapter 4

“What do I know about Bruce Wayne?” Jim asked himself, while Bullock went to pick up the city boy. “Not that much,” he had to admit.   
Like most everyone, he knew Bruce Wayne had been heir of one of the richest families of the State, a well known and valued stockbroker, a philanthropist and a playboy. Jim's mother used to say that young Wayne liked to be the bride of every wedding and the deceased of every funeral, but she used to say that of a lot of people, including Reverend Dowley and Rabbi Holden.   
Renee Montoya had said a couple of times that he had a great ass. Barbara had said he was hot, which was bad, but not as bad as Babs saying he was hot and his ward, Dick Grayson, even hotter.   
Jim didn't know the reasons of Wayne's falling from grace. He knew it had something to do with an accident Wayne had in Germany, and his partner and wife bleeding him dry while he was out of commission. Barbara had commented that he had it coming for marrying a hussy like Selina Kyle and trusting a shark like Morris Grant, but she was partial on the matter since Grant was the one who had thrown a wrench in Barbara's plan to go working for the Governor.  
All Jim knew for sure was that such a big fish as Bruce Wayne in such a small pond like Gotham meant nothing but trouble with a capital T. The fact that less than a month after his moving in, the fallen star was tangled up in the first murder the county had in thirty-three years proved the point more than his teenager daughter's comments about the hotness of the newcomers.

Accompanied by Bullock, Bruce walked out of the trailer, and a salvo of flashes flooded over him, while the members of the press started to scream loudly his name and tried to force the deputies' line to reach him.   
Wisely, Bullock grabbed the younger man by the arm and made a hasty retreat into the trailer.   
Cursing the press, Jim barked orders to his deputies to hold the line and walked in the trailer, closing the door behind him.

Unfazed by the cacophony outside, Bruce nodded to Bullock, turned and offered his hand to the sheriff.   
“Bruce Wayne, Sheriff Gordon. I’d say it’s a pleasure to meet you, but the circumstances aren’t exactly ideal, now, are they?”   
His voice, a deep warm baritone, made Jim think of smoke, heat, Jazz in the background and, to his utter surprise, sex.

“Damn”, he thought, clearing his mind from the fastidious association. He didn't know why, but he felt suddenly threatened. Unconsciously, he upped his defenses, acknowledged Wayne's overture with a curt nod of his head and ignored Bruce's extended hand.   
He studied Bruce with what, he hoped, looked like deliberate detachment and not open coldness, knowing he was being rude, but unable to avoid it.   
There was no mistaking the air of authority that the younger man exuded. He had what Jim called a predatory animal magnetism that radiated from his patrician face and the angular lines of his athletic body, which charged the air around him.   
Even damp and rumpled, with his dark hair plastered to the forehead, his jeans and polo shirt disheveled and wet, he looked regal and that, Jim was sure, had nothing to do with the status of his bank accounts.

“Here we go again,” Bruce thought, looking curiously at the sheriff. The older man, with his thick mustaches and avuncular look, didn’t much fit the part of a county sheriff, but beneath the thick glasses, he had the eyes of a white wolf.

“ Here's the alpha dog of the pack,” Bruce thought with certainty. The sheriff was surely the alpha male of Gotham's community. The way he was reacting so territorially in the presence of another alpha was straight from the text book, as was the way all his subordinates acted around him. Even Bullock, who in Bruce's opinion, wasn't keen to take shit from anybody, seemed to fold like an origami swan around Gordon, and that had nothing to do with the close fitting uniform and badge the man was wearing.

Without thinking, Bruce smiled and silently challenged Gordon to game of staring. He usually didn't like to get into pissing contests with other alphas if not absolutely necessary, but he'd just had the last of a long series of awful days and he felt damp, cranky and in strong need of a little ego boost.

Jim locked gazes with Bruce and gave him a long, level stare that told him, better than thousands words, that there was no way he was going to be out topped by a puny city boy on his county.   
Bullock felt the undercurrent running and decided he had certainly better things to do outside.

The contest didn't last more than few seconds, but it was enough for Bruce to realize he was dealing with the strongest dominant male he had met after Alfred, and he never won against Alfred either.   
Bruce had the disconcerting feeling that the sheriff could see right past his shields and defenses; that he could see clear into his soul if he wanted to, which made him one dangerous man. Bruce averted his eyes first.

“What time did you find the body?” Jim asked, moving his interest from the contest to the matters at hand. He wasn't sure what had really happened between him and the city boy, but he was sure it wasn't a good thing, since it'd made his heart beat a little faster and brought a chill down his spine that had nothing to do with the weather.   
The man in front of him, Jim decided, was dangerous, even if he couldn't say why.

“I have no idea,” Bruce answered, mustering a calm he wasn't feeling. “My cell was dead and I'm not wearing watches nowadays.”   
He could have added that his collection of Rolexes was probably sleeping in the bank vault of one of those islands that doesn't grant extradition to US, or taking a turn around Selina's wrist, but he doubted the man in front of him would have cared. He didn’t strike him as the sympathetic sort.  
His face could have been carved from stone for all the emotion it showed.

“I found the body and came inside here to make the call. I guess the 911 must have the time recorded.”

“Did you see who killed him?”

“No. I didn’t see anybody, except...” Bruce's voice faded away as his gaze flicked toward the window and in the general direction of the corpse.   
Bruce pressed his lips together and swallowed down the lump of revulsion that clogged his throat. He couldn’t stop the image that flashed through his head: Napier dead, blood everywhere on his clothes, the seat and floor of the car. Thomas Wayne, his father, had looked exactly the same after the car crash, when he was quickly bleeding to death with a sliver of glass stuck in his neck. Bile rose in his throat, and he shivered again.

“Was he like that when you found him?” Gordon kept on asking, all business and no compassion.

“Yes. He was inside the car. There was so much blood and he...”

“He what?”

“He was dead already”

“You checked on him?” There was something accusatory in the sheriff's tone, and Bruce was starting to get enough of that bully's attitude.

“I saw my parents die in front of me when I was eight years old,” he spat out. “I recognize a dead man when I see one.”

Gordon felt sorry for the younger man, but he also still felt too irked by his reactions to the man in front of him to take his boorish attitude down a notch, or two. He didn't like it himself, but he seemed unable to correct it.

“Did you opened the car?”

“Nope. It was already open.”

“And you didn't touch the body?”

“That's correct.”

“So the BCI won't find your prints there?”

“Not if they don't put them there themselves.”

Jim shook his head pensively, as if the answers he was getting weren't those he was expecting. “Anything else I should know?” he asked.

“I don't think so. Your victim was as he is now expect for his trousers.”

“What about his trousers?” Suddenly, Jim felt like they were going somewhere.

“The fly was open. The family jewels were on display.” Bruce saw the surprise in the sheriff's face and had a thrill of satisfaction. The alpha didn't get all the control he wanted, after all.

“What?” Jim felt his temper wavering. “Why on earth did you tamper with the scene.”

“I didn't.” Bruce forced himself to glance again out of the window.“ One of yours did...”

“Which one?”

Bruce moved toward the window to point at the man, but before he could do anything Jim opened the door and yelled. “Flass!” in such a tone that all the heads turned his way.   
Bruce had to bite his lower lip to keep from smirking. It was good to see all those bad vibes directed at someone else.

Flass shuffled his feet on the gravel and moved toward the trailer ruefully. He could have hated Gordon for taking the star away from him, but there was no doubt he feared the man a whole lot.

“You tampered with the scene?” Jim asked, deadly calm, as soon as his deputy was inside and the door closed again.

Flass mumbled, “We couldn’t leave him that way, Jim. It wasn’t decent.”

“Decent?” Jim questioned, his voice under control, but barely.

The deputy swallowed hard. “I just zipped him up. Hell, I don't think he was killed because he was giving air to his dick.”

Jim arched a brow, his temper in grave danger of boiling over. His voice grew even softer. “No, Arnie? And you happen to know that because?”

Flass closed his eyes, wincing. All his explanations stuck in his throat.

“Suppose Jack flashed his merchandise to the wrong person and got his throat slashed open because of it. You know how much Jack was fond of novelties...”

Bruce’s mouth dropped open as Gordon’s words sank in. Furious, he bolted forward. “Just what do you mean by that crack?” he said, impulsively grabbing hold of Jim's arm.

Jim looked at Bruce's hand as if it was a deadly weapon. And maybe it was. He definitely felt something akin to electricity at the contact. It made his ears buzz.   
Bruce felt it too. As casually as he could manage without giving himself away, he removed his hand from the sheriff's arm and took a half-step away from him. The word “dangerous” drifted through his mind again.

“Are you implying I had something to do with Napier's death?”

“I’m inferring that you may not be telling us the whole truth, Mr. Wayne,” Jim said. “We can not know for certain until we question you.”

“You're already questioning me, you moron.” Anger flashed in Bruce's eyes like quicksilver, and he took a deep breath, trying to calm down before making things worse. He had to bite his tongue to keep himself from telling Mr. Redneck sheriff what to do with his theory.

Jim motioned for Flass to come closer. “Arnie, take Mr. Wayne back to the station and wait for me there.”

“Are you arresting me, Sheriff?” Bruce asked, his voice a slow hiss.

“Not at the moment.”

“Then I should be able to come in on my own, later,” Bruce argued. Alpha dog or not, he wasn't going to be manhandled in front of the press just to satisfy some frustrated ego.

“No. You won't.” Jim leaned over Bruce, trying to intimidate him with his scowl. The younger man didn't even flinch.  
“You’re a witness in a murder investigation, and you're going to the station now. I don't want to read your statement in the papers first.” Without looking at Bruce, he gave a curt nod to Flass. “Take him to the station and make sure he's comfortable. It may take a while before I'll be able to come and take his statement.”

Flass pouted. A worry line creased up between his brows. “But the lab guys...”

“Will muddle through without your expert supervision,” Jim said dryly, finally ready to go back to the scene. “And if you're lucky, they won't think you're stupid just because you thought that decency was better than the prints you may have covered with yours.”

Bruce's sudden clapping made Jim stop and turn back once again. He could tell Bruce was livid.

“So this is how you want to play it, Sheriff? I'm sure showing Bruce Wayne carried away in a patrol car from a crime scene will grant you all the first pages of tomorrow's papers and the openings of tonight's news. Hope it won't come back to bite you in the ass.”

Suddenly stricken by a bout of guilt, Jim flicked a glance at the reporters and photographers who were waiting like hyenas just outside the trailer. Wayne was right. In a moment, they all would be taping and recording the scene for their papers or news programs, putting Bruce Wayne, and him, in the front of the storm.   
In his irrational need to put some distance between him and Wayne, he was going to give the press something even more juicy than the murder.   
What the hell had gotten into him to react that way? He tried to convince himself that it probably was because he felt sure that Wayne was involved in some way with the murder, but it didn't fly. He was just making a blunder out of an unexpected epidermic reaction to another man's presence. If only his stubbornness wasn't strong enough to keep him from backing down before making the mistake even bigger.

Bruce seemed to perceive the sheriff's sudden struggle and, for a reason he couldn't explain even to himself, took pity of him.   
“The press will eat a country sheriff like you alive, sheriff. You'd better stay behind and see how a pro deals with them,“ he smirked.   
The fact that he'd taken pity of the sheriff didn't mean he had to make things easier for the man. “Let's go, deputy Flass. Let's give the press something to justify the trip to Anytown Anywhere.”

Followed by a very confused Flass, Bruce walked out of the trailer and let the reporters storm around him. He played the press like a piano. He managed to explain his presence there, and his going away with a deputy sheriff, without giving a single detail of the scene he'd witnessed away.  
He also managed to throw in a, “thank you Sheriff Gordon,” for the willingness to lend him him a car and a drive to go to the car shop.

Watching Wayne mesmerize so many people like a snake charmer, Jim couldn't help but chuckle in spite of the fact that he still disliked the man.   
It was too damn bad Wayne was nothing but trouble because, deep down, Jim knew there were affinities between them and the potential for a good friendship. If only Renee wasn't right about Wayne having a great ass.


	5. Chapter 5

Arnold Flass was a satisfied man. He had been scolded by that son of a bitch of a sheriff, but he was the one escorting the star witness away from the crime scene, so all the cameras had been on him. He made a mental note to get as many copies of the photos as he could. They would come in handy when the next election rolled around.   
He also had in his pocket the only thing linking him to Jack Napier, and he didn't care if getting it back had required him to play stupid in front of Gordon and the lab guys of the BCI, or that he had to handle a dead man's prick.   
The damned note, stating he owed Jack Napier 28000 bucks, had been in Napier's pants pocket all day. The bastard had slipped it out and set it on the table at the Coffee Cup just that morning, while pretending to hunt for change for a tip. Arnold had just about died at the sight of it. For the minute and a half that slip of paper had lain on the table, in plain sight of half the town, he had seen his whole cursed life pass before his eyes and swirl right down the toilet. If anyone in Gotham got wind of him owing Napier or, more important, why he owed him, he could just kiss his political career good-bye.   
Now he was free of that burden. Without Jack there was nothing between him and winning back the sheriff office from Gordon in the next election; all the skeletons were buried again, and he didn't have to find 28000 dollars. The murderer, whoever he was, had done him a big favor, and if by any chance he'd managed to stay on the loose and make Gordon look like an ass, that would be just the perfect icing for the cake.

Bruce studied the old deputy from the corner of his eye, not liking what he could see of his face in the light from the dashboard instruments. He had the look of a bully about him; the kind of man who sought out positions of authority to give him a sense of power over other people. That reminded him of Morris Grant, and the association made him dislike the enforcer of the law on sight, which made two out of two in a single night. Quite a record, Bruce had to admit.

The image of Jim Gordon came back to mind uncalled. Churlish, wolfish, handsome. “Handsome?” Bruce mused. “Where the hell did that come from?” Since when did he start to notice men's handsomeness? OK, he'd sort of sworn off women after Selina, but that was a far cry away from starting to find redneck country sheriffs handsome. Wasn't it?

“Did you know him?” he asked Flass quite abruptly, needing to break the traitorous train of thought.   
Flass jerked his head in his direction as if he’d forgotten the city boy was sitting there. “Napier? Sure I knew him. Everybody did,” he said almost defiantly, daring Wayne to dispute the fact that the dead man had been well known, if not well loved.

“This is quite a shock, I guess,” Bruce said, intrigued.

Flass shifted on the seat and mumbled something under his breath as he adjusted the volume control on the police radio. The crackle of static rose, making Bruce flinch at the discordant screeching. Then the radio tuned in automatically when word of the BCI mobile lab’s imminent arrival came across the airwaves.   
Flass chewed on a swear word, clenched his jaw, and tightened his grip on the steering wheel.

“I take it you don’t approve,” Bruce commented, simulating a hint of boredom in his voice to keep the deputy from noticing how the whole matter was affecting him.

“We could handle this ourselves,” Flass said, still defensive. “ Gordon brings in those city boys, and we’ll be nothing but gofers. We don’t need a bunch of college geeks poking around.”

A sly smile tugged at one corner of Bruce's mouth. Dissension among the ranks. He knew without having to ask that Gordon would hate it. He had the air of the absolute ruler about him.

“Gordon’s blowing this investigation by calling in outsiders. We can take care of our own in Gotham County,” Flass continued. “I should have beat him in the last election.”

“What went wrong?” Bruce asked candidly, the perfect picture of someone just trying to keep a conversation going. He wasn't developing a morbid fascination about the sheriff. Not at all. Not him.

“He only won because he was Gotham's prodigal son coming home, and a decorated marine 'heroically' wounded in action...”

Bruce's imagination instantly conjured up a picture of Gordon in full combat gear. The man looked a bit too much on the slim side to fill that kind of uniform, but that meant nothing. Alfred was as thin as a ladder, and he'd been a SAS.

“And his ex wife is a big shark in this county,” Flass continued. “The moment she backed him up for the office, the run was over. No matter how much I've done for this county in my years as sheriff.”

“Or maybe just because of those years,” Bruce thought without voicing his suspicions aloud. “Guess people around here were a little fed up with your attitude.”

The headlights of the cruiser spotlighted Bruce's car, which hung off the side of the road, and he sighed.   
Fucking drive shaft. If it hadn’t been for that, he'd be at home now, totally unaware of Jack Napier's murder and totally unconcerned about Sheriff Gordon.   
Flass slowed the cruiser and gave the car a suspicious glance, showing off his miraculous cop instincts. “That yours?”

“Yeah. That's it,” Bruce mumbled.

“What happened?” Flass asked, an extra touch of arrogance sneaking into his voice as if only country boys could know their cars. “Run out of gas?”

“No. The drive shaft's gone. Hit a hole in the street as big as the Gran Canyon.” If Flass missed the unsaid, “thanks to your fucking country road,” he wasn't the good detective he thought he was.

“That was old Kane's car, right?”

“Yeah. Guess it must be older than me, and I should have taken a better care of it, but when you're accustomed to the sound of a Lamborghini or a Ferrari, all the other cars sound like mewling cats.” He said it with deliberate smugness and savored the mop of pure envy appearing in Flass' face.   
“In your face, old fart.” he wanted to add, but desisted.

“Have any ideas on who might have killed Napier?” he asked instead, steering the conversation back on track.

“Do you?” Flass' eyes darted his way. “You’re the witness.”

“Me? I didn’t witness much more than the body in the car. And I’m not long on theories either. Don’t know anyone round here well enough to say whether or not they might kill someone. How about you? You must know everybody around here, and who’d want Napier dead and gone.”

Flass' face set into a scowl. Ignoring Bruce, he reached for the microphone of the radio, and he called in to tell someone named Agatha that he was bringing in a witness and she had better have everything ready. Deputy Flass' loquaciousness was apparently not going to extend beyond bad-mouthing his boss, Bruce decided, letting the conversation die.

Gotham had closed up for the night. The imitation gaslights, which lined Main Street, cast a hazy glow on the shop fronts that shouldered up against one another on either side of the wide main street. The facades of the buildings, which had been constructed in the early 1880s, stood like silent sentinels, dark windows staring blankly as the police car cruised past.   
A tidy little town, Gotham was kept spit-and-polish clean out of habit. There weren't any trash in the gutters or shop fronts in need of paint. Wooden tubs of geraniums sat curbside at regular intervals. The occasional red park bench, tucked up against a building, offered respite for those weary of walking from gift shop to gift shop. A banner had been strung up above Main Street advertising the annual Town Birthday festival that would begin in one week.

The cruiser rolled slowly past the old building that housed the Gotham Gazette. Like its neighbors to the north and south, it was two stories high and built with dark bricks. The adjoining courthouse squatted like an enormous toadstool right in the center of town, surrounded on three sides by Battery Park. Also built in the early 1880s, when Gotham had gained the title of County seat, it was constructed of big square blocks of limestone. It wasn't an impressive building, by any stretch of imagination, but it did have the Clock tower in the center that resembled the one from that movie with Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, and a time traveling DeLorean.

Flass pulled the cruiser into the parking lot and nosed it into a slot up against the side of the building that was marked SHERIFF GORDON. Bruce felt a smile threaten, but he ironed it out. Whatever this antagonism was between the sheriff and his deputy, it wasn’t cute. The gleam in Flass' eye was too malicious to be mistaken for cute.

Flass led the way into the building through a side door marked GOTHAM COUNTY LAW ENFORCEMENT CENTER, down a set of marble stairs, and along a cool white hall, glaring with fluorescent overhead lighting. Bruce followed him along the corridor and to the right, the soles of his probably, permanently damaged leather shoes thumping dully against the smooth, hard floor.   
He wondered what would come next, and how long it would take. Dick and Tim were supposed to be home and in bed already, but they were probably both up and concerned about him. Damn his cell phone for deciding to die the same day as the car (it was the reason he was driving the car in the first place), and damn him for not feeling right about using the phone in the trailer to call the boys.  
Of course, at the time he didn't think that calling 911 would have turned into such a mess.

“Agatha,” Flass said in a tone of voice that rang with phony authority, “this is Mister Wayne. He’s the one who found Napier. Jim wants him to wait in his office. I have to get back out there and help secure the crime scene.” He hitched up his pants and puffed out his chest. Macho and tough, the man in command.

Behind her big, U-shaped desk, Agatha Worthington gave Flass the cold, hard look of a woman who wasn’t fooled by much and certainly wasn’t fooled by him.   
The secretary sat at her post with schoolmarm posture and pinched lips. Her hair was trapped in a cast-iron chignon, and her eyebrows penciled on in a style intended to make her look stern and to minimize the motherly quality of her eyes. She stared at Flass from behind rhinestone-studded glasses, and she somehow managed to look down her straight, long nose at him, even though he towered over her desk.

“The crime lab is about to arrive,” she announced imperiously. “You’d better get out there, or there won’t be anything left for you to do except sweep up the coffee cups.”

Flass narrowed his eyes to slits and scowled at her without noticeable effect, and then turned on his heel and stalked away as Agatha snatched up the receiver off the ringing telephone to her right.

“Gotham County sheriff’s office . . . No, the sheriff has no statement at this time . . . No arrests have been made that I’m aware of,” she said, turning an eye on Bruce, taking in his untidy appearance. Bruce acknowledged her disapproval, opened his arms as if to say 'it's not my fault,' and showed his best 'good boy' smile at the old lady. She didn't fall for it, but nodded in his direction, as if confirming that, about him, the jury was going to remain out until a better occasion arose. That was more than he'd had from the locals in all the evening.

“I wouldn’t know anything anyway. Now, I must ask you to hang up. This line has to be left open for emergencies.” Agatha ended the call herself, cradling the receiver with a resounding thump.

“I don’t mind telling you, young man, that I dislike this business intensely,” she said sternly, her gaze still boring through Bruce as if it was his fault for reporting the murder instead of minding his own business. “There hasn’t been a murder in Gotham County in thirty-three years. I don’t like it a bit.”

The phone at Agatha's elbow rang again, and Bruce waited for her to hang up again before asking if there was a phone he could use.   
The secretary gave him a long look that Bruce guessed was intended to communicate the woman’s feelings about using public services and public money for personal interest.  
“I want to call my kids and tell them what's happening,” he said and the old lady melted completely. The 'wicked witch of the west' went away, leaving in her stead the loving granny she probably was once out of the station.

“The boys you adopted?” she asked, giving the first real sign that she knew who Bruce Wayne was.

“Yes,” Bruce confirmed. “Sort of. Dick and Tim are in my foster care. I'd started the procedures to adopt them before everything went downhill. I think the social services won't consider it an option now that I'm single and practically ruined, but at least they left the kids in my care for the time being.”

That won Bruce Wayne his first fan and ally in the whole county.   
Agatha Worthington left her desk and with a conspiratorial “follow me,” and she led Bruce through the maze of gray metal desks toward the door of Jim Gordon’s private lair.   
“You can use his phone,” she said to Bruce, implying it was just alright, since it was Jim's fault if he couldn't be with the kids already.

“Thanks, Mrs. Worthington,” Bruce nodded and smiled fondly for the first time in the whole evening. “I promise I will call just the kids.”

“Oh. Call me Agatha. And you'd better do just that. If Jim puts the calls on me, I'm going to kick your ass.” Agatha smiled back, then without another word she hustled Bruce into the office, thrust a cup of black coffee into his hand, and bolted back for her station, swinging the door shut behind her.

Bruce went to Gordon's desk, picked up the phone, and dialed the number. The phone at the other end went unanswered for five rings before the answering machine switched on. He swore under his breath and tried again and again. After the tenth attempt, he left a message and hung up, cursing.   
Then he tried Dick's cell phone, but had the same result. He prayed Dick and Tim were both so deeply asleep and missed all the ringing, but he doubted it. Dick would have slept in a tornado, but Tim was a light sleeper. There was no way he'd miss all those calls. Where the hell were they in a night like this?   
Now he was really concerned.


	6. Chapter 6

Bruce tried not to think too much about the kids being out of phone reach in a small town, which was still foreign to them, on the night of the first murder Gotham had witnessed in 33 years. After deciding, in random order, to give Tim a cell phone, no matter if it was too soon; to have Dick's ring-tone changed to an amplified version of Westminster's bells; and to glue a tracking GPS device on both kids, Bruce started to plan ways to escape from the Sheriff's office and the station without getting shot. The bars outside the windows made him desist. Resigned, he tried again to call home, and then he sipped the lukewarm coffee Agatha had provided him. He came to the conclusion that there were things less extreme than that coffee to try first in life, such us jumping off a cliff with a sheet for a parachute for example.   
He resisted the urge to call Alfred. There was nothing the man could do from the city anyway. Then, to drive his mind away from his worries, he started to prowl around Gordon's office, studying and looking for clues about the man. Not that he cared on a personal level. From what he’d seen, Jim Gordon was a first class SOB. It was just good sense to know your adversary. Yeah. Right. That was his story, and he was sticking to it, no matter what.

The office was unremarkable: flat white paint on the walls, one large window looking inside, which would have given a panoramic view of the rest of the station if the blinds had been raised, one window looking outside with bars a couple of inches thick bolted to the wall,mousy gray carpet,a row of black file cabinets, and the usual office paraphernalia, including a personal computer. Diplomas and citations hung in simple black frames on one wall.   
There was nothing here of Jim Gordon the man, no mounted deer heads or bowling trophies, but the medal with the red, white, and blue ribbon framed in a silver plated cornice confirmed Flass' assumptions that Gordon was a decorated soldier.

The man was neat and that, in Bruce's opinion, was a bad sign. Men who were neat liked to be in control of everything and everyone around them.   
Jim Gordon's desk shouted control. Files were labeled, stacked, and lined up just so. His pens were all in their little ceramic holder, tips down, arranged left to right by ink color, no doubt.   
Beside the telephone was the one personal item in the room, a small wooden picture frame. Bruce lifted the frame and turned it for a look. The photograph was of two kids, a young girl of 15 or 16 and a boy of 11 or 12 give or take some. The girl was a very pretty read head in full teenage bloom, probably the queen bee of the local high school on her way to being the next head cheerleader, and probably a grade A student everywhere because she looked damn smart beneath the eyeglasses. The boy was just starting to show signs of growing into a gangly youth with blond hair in the customary bowl cut, a shy smile, and freckles on his cheeks. He looked familiar, but Bruce couldn't say why.   
He had probably seen the kid around Gotham, which wasn't such an impossible task as he had probably seen the whole population of Gotham. Twice.

He smiled at the “LOVE YOU, DADDY” handwritten dedication at the bottom of the picture. Not that he needed it to figure out the identity of the kids. The resemblance with the sheriff was quite remarkable.

“Well,” Bruce commented sarcastically. “Somebody actually married the son of a bitch.”

“She has since seen the error of her ways, I assure you.”

Bruce whirled toward the sound of the mocking voice, managing to restrain himself from looking guilty.

“Busted,” Bruce admitted candidly, meeting Jim's steady gaze as he turned back toward him.

“Not sure I like the image of you with the picture of my kids in your hands.” Jim hitched at his slacks and moved to go sit on his armchair, his mouth twitching at one corner with what looked like a smile gone sour. “No. I'm pretty much sure I don't like it at all.”

“I'm glad your opinion about me hasn't changed since we met at the Resort,” Bruce asserted in the same tone, putting down the picture with care.   
He started to move to avoid being trapped between the sheriff and the wall.  
He stepped forward the same moment Jim pushed the armchair aside to make room for him to pass, and they almost bumped into each other.  
Both men raised their heads and sucked in a breath of air, startled by the sudden nearness. They both made no move to touch each other, but they both could feel the other just the same. They skirted around each other gingerly, making a big deal about pretending they didn't notice anything out the ordinary.

Bruce took a seat in one of the other chairs, crossed his arms over his chest, and with the tip of his shoe, kicked distractedly at the desk, finally in front of him, as if to make sure it was there and was solid enough.   
Jim mimicked all Bruce's moves, unconsciously reassured by the presence of several feet of solid oak between him and Wayne. He was the one starting the staring game this time, but Bruce wasn't in the mood to play anymore.

“You can stare at me until the cows come home, sheriff. It won't change the fact that I've got nothing to do with your murder, and that I'm dog tired of all this shit, and I want to go home.”

“Really?” Jim smirked. “Let me be the judge of that.”

“With all due respect, which isn't much to start with, I wouldn't let you judge the piglets in a country fair, Sheriff.”

“How come? I did a good job last year,” Jim drawled, sliding more comfortably into his upholstered chair. “For your information, I was the only one not voting for his own piglet. They even let me judge the pumpkins after that.”

“And here, in the middle of nowhere, the best comedian of his generation fades away, unnoticed and unappreciated,” Bruce retorted. “Now if 'Beginners Hour' is over, can we move on?”

Jim unwrapped his right arm from across his stomach, and he used the free hand to rub where the pads of his glasses had started to irritate his nose.  
“Why such a hurry? Afraid you'll incriminate yourself if you stay around too long?” “

“Why should I be worried about that?” Bruce challenged him. “Or have you decided that the easiest way to sweep a murder under the carpet is to pin it to the newcomer who was stupid enough to call 911?”

Jim ignored the sarcasm. “Jack Napier had tried to buy your farm more than once.”

“And he could have managed to buy it from me, if he came with a real offer instead of a joke. I may be in bad waters, but I still know how to evaluate a property.”

“That's a motive. He tried to cheat you...”

Bruce shook his head and started laughing. It took him a couple of attempts before gaining back his composure.   
“My father's partner spent the last 20 years planning and scheming ways to steal my family's money. He took advantage of me being in a coma in Germany to strike, and he destroyed my family's company in, give or take, 21 days. He robbed all our clients once and me twice, since I had to use the rest of my assets to cover the losses of our investors.   
If that wasn't bad enough, my wife, who I suspect was a plant from the start, took away everything the son of a bitch missed. In a potential list of people I'd want see punished for defrauding me, your Jack Napier would rank very, very low. Probably lower than the girl who kicked me in the nuts in kinder garten.”

“Interesting... You're aware that no one had seen Morris Grant and Selina Kyle in quite a while, aren't you?” Jim was being an asshole and he knew it, but he couldn’t seem to help himself. Bruce Wayne was just the kind of man who brought out the bastard in him. He'd met some people like him during his time with the Marines Corps, and it'd been his duty as drill sergeant to take them down a notch or ten. It had become a sort of second nature with him. Yeah, he thought, that must be the reason. Not the electricity that sizzled in the air between them every time they got a little too close.

“That won't stick either, Sheriff. Sorry to piss on your parade... or let me re-phrase it. Glad to piss on your parade, but there are at least 3 different federal departments looking for Grant. Last time I checked with them, they missed him by a matter of hours in Macao. And about Selina,I keep receiving post cards from all around the world with the words 'Thinking of you' handwritten on them. Same feds are pretty much sure they're from her. Now, if you don't have anything else, I'd like to go home. The Asian markets are going to open in a matter of minutes.” He wasn't going to bring in his worries about the kids not answering the phone. Gordon was the kind of man to use it against him.

“And that's important because?”

“Because the stock market is still how I get my bread and cheese these days,” Bruce snapped. “And I've got two kids at home who have some very bad habits, such as wanting to eat 3 times a day and go to school wearing clothes.   
Since I'm sure you're going to ask, the answer is YES. There's still people who trust me enough to let me invest their money and pay me to do that.   
So if you're next 'motive' was because I was selling my body for money, and Napier didn't want to buy, or the other way around, that won't stick either.”

“The perils of your virtue, or lack thereof, weren't a concern of mine, to be honest. But it's an interesting angle, especially knowing how Jack was found.”   
Truth be told, the idea of Wayne hustling did something to him, but he didn't want to examine what too closely. Not now, and if he have a say on it, not ever.

“Nonsense. If I wanted a career as a male escort, I wouldn't have moved from the city. Lots of people would have payed to get me in bed, and none of them carried a Y chromosome. Why? Do you think Jack Napier could have been interested?”

The image of Jack Napier touching Wayne with his skinny, filthy hands, hit Jim with such violence he had to force himself to keep from recoiling visibly.

“What about your grandfather...” he said instead, trying to bring the conversation back to safer grounds.

“What about him?”

“He and Napier carried on a feud for decades.”

“That's Wilburn Kane in all his glory.”

“He's left his farm to you.”

“My grandma Irma left it to me.”

“Semantics.”

“The hell it is. I don't know what your opinion of Wilburn Kane was, but from this side of the fence he was a life form ranking lower than rattlesnakes and scorpions.”  
Jim kept himself from confirming it was more or less the same even on his side of the fence.

“ He hated my father. He repudiated my mother for marrying him,” Bruce continued, boiling anger struggling to surface. “I was 8 years old when my parents died in that car crash. The only relatives I had left were my mother's parents, and Wilburn Kane didn't even come to the funeral. He refused to have any kind of contact with me. He never met me, and never answered to my letters. He was the one who signed off my guardianship to Alfred.”

“Alfred?”

“Alfred Pennyworth, my family's butler and tutor. And that's been a blessing because I couldn't have found a better man to watch over me.” Bruce's voice quivered and he berated himself for that. He didn't like to show his weaknesses, especially in front of people like Jim Gordon.   
“My grandmother spent the last 20 years inventing lies upon lies to tell my grandfather just to come to see me from time to time. She told him she had a tumor and needed chemotherapy just to spend some weeks with me and away from him two or three times a year, and he never cared enough to ask around if it was true or not. So it's not semantic. And I think you'll forgive me, if I say that I really don't give a flying fuck about the feud between Wilburn Kane and Jack Napier. Wish they'd offed each other a long time ago, so I wouldn't be here right now.”

The words hung between them, adding to the emotional tension that thickened the air like humidity. Jim sat back, a little ashamed of himself, not at all pleased that his poking had stripped away a layer of armor and given him a glimpse of the man behind it. Not at all pleased that he felt sorry for the boy. He didn’t want to feel sorry. The truth was he didn’t want Bruce Wayne to be anything other than what he had imagined him to be: a spoiled rotten city boy, raised with the silver spoon, and totally detached from the real people like him.   
He didn’t want to know that Bruce Wayne could be, and had been, hurt.

Bruce forced his shoulders back against the chair and sort of deflated, the stress of the evening finally catching up with him.

“I'm tired, sheriff,” he admitted. “I want to go home, so let me go or charge me with something.”

“Tell me what happened out there tonight,” Jim Gordon said softly, knowing he was in trouble. He was starting to feel something like sympathy growing for the city boy and that was bad. It made him feel vulnerable, and he didn't want to feel vulnerable around Bruce Wayne.


	7. Chapter 7

Jim pulled a pocket cassette recorder out of his top right desk drawer and clicked it on.   
“For the record,” he explained, tilting his head in formal deference. “This is the statement of Bruce Wayne regarding Jack Napier's murder.” He plunked the recorder between them on the desk.   
Bruce regarded it with a suspicious look.

“From where?” he asked

“From the start.”

“I worked all day at home,” Bruce began.

“Doing what?”

“A friend of mine asked me to take a look at his Stock portfolio and help him re-do it to minimize some losses he's having.”

“Does he have a name?”

“Is it important?”

“Yes, if he's local.”

“Oliver Queen. Boarding school roommate, and consequentially not local...”

Jim found himself wondering if Bruce Wayne and Oliver Queen used to fool around in school, and then, startled by the magnitude of his own flight of fancy, he wondered why he'd thought of such a thing to start with. What was wrong with him all of a sudden? Where did all that sexual tension come from? It didn't make sense at all. And it was distracting him from listening to Wayne.

“... He and Alfred are my only clients at the moment. Between them and the little investments I'm doing with grandma Irma's money, I manage to gain more or less the same you do, sheriff.”

“The butler is your client?” Another trifling question, Jim thought. Was it becoming more important to him to learn about Wayne than about the murder?

“ Yes,” Bruce answered, a little annoyed. He too was thinking it was a useless question.

“Must be humiliating.” Jim realized he was still being rude and mumbled an almost inaudible, “Sorry!”

Bruce fought to hide his surprise. He was pretty sure the sheriff wasn't the kind who apologized easily.

“Not at all. Alfred is like a father to me. I always liked to make him rich and I still do. Then again, I need a job to keep the kids. I wouldn't mind being his butler if necessary.   
Now that I think of it, I offered to be his butler, but he preferred to have me as his stockbroker. Does this matter to your investigation?”

“Not sure yet.” Jim answered, admitting to himself that no, probably it didn't matter to the investigation, but it started to matter more and more to him and that meant more troubles.   
He had a soft spot for strays. His small farm was filled to the brim with stray cats and dogs he'd picked up along the road. He simply couldn't resist them (tor the joy of Babs and Jim Jr.). Was he starting to see Wayne as another stray to take care of?

“Let's go back to this evening.” Jim decided to stop asking himself stupid questions and try to go back to business. “Why were you on the site of the Resort?”

 

“About a quarter to seven my cell phone died. Cell phone's the third more important thing for my work after the computer and the broad band, so I took the Oldsmobile and drove to Gotham.”

“Kane's Oldsmobile?”

“Yup. The one and only.”

“Don't you have another car?”

“Nope. Sold them all to cover my company's losses. Alfred offered to lend me one, but all he's got is an Aston Martin, a Bentley, and a HUMMER. All of them a bit too cumbersome for a life in the countryside.   
Anyway the old, rusting bitch took a hole and broke its drive shaft. I didn’t have much choice but to start walking.”

“So you turned into the Resort site?”

“After it started raining. I saw the trailer first, with the roof. Thought I could wait there till it stopped. I saw Napier's car with the door open. I guessed he was in the car making a call or listening to the radio. Then I saw the blood...”

Bruce stopped then and shuddered as the memory descended on him like an anvil. The image flashed before his eyes: Napier dead, his black, lifeless eyes staring up at him, his blood splashed all over his white shirt.   
He flinched and tried to swallow the revulsion crowding his throat as waves of hot and cold flushed through him, leaving him feeling dizzy and weak.

Jim watched Bruce struggle with the emotions suddenly threatening to overwhelm him. It reminded Jim of scenes seen at the front. Strong, burly men coming out of tragic situations without breaking a sweat just to fall apart later, victim of a belated shock. Bruce (when had he moved from Wayne to Bruce in his own mind? Jim asked himself) was exactly like those soldiers. He had the same shaking, combination of terror, denial, and revulsion in his expression. It could be faked, Jim admitted to himself, but he doubted Bruce was such a good actor. The kid (kid?) was falling apart, and Jim felt bad for having harassed him to that point.  
Jim watched the rise of tears in Bruce's eyes. “It’s all right,” he whispered and steeled himself against the urge to jump from his chair and go to comfort the younger man.

“I’m sorry,” Bruce mumbled, his breath hitching in his throat, “it's just that...”

“What?” Jim heard his voice and almost didn't recognize it. It seemed like the one he had used to comfort Jim Jr. while they drove to the hospital after he had broken his leg falling from a tree.

“My father.” Even Bruce's voice sounded to Jim like that of Jim Jr. while he was trying not to cry for the pain.

“What about your father?”

“He looked like Napier. The day of the car crash. A splinter of glass had cut his carotid. He was already dead when I climbed out of the car... And he looked just like...”

“OK... I understand. I'm sorry you have to go through it again, but I need to know. What happened after you found the body?”

“I blacked out for a bit. Can't say how long,” Bruce admitted. He dropped back down into his chair, exhausted and tense. He leaned forward and grasped the edge of the seat with both hands, rocking slowly from side to side to relieve a little of his nervous energy as the rest of the memory played through his mind.

“I saw the door of the trailer open, and I ran there to see if there was a phone to use.”

“Didn't occur to you that the killer could have been hidden there?”

Bruce shivered.  
“Not till this moment. Thanks for the new scary picture to add to the collection.” He tried for the sarcasm that had helped him dealing with the whole mess at the start, but there was no traces of it anymore. Now he sounded exactly how he felt: tired and scared.

“And you didn't touch the body?”

“No. I should have, but I couldn't force myself to do it. Sorry!”

“It's alright. So you called 911 and then what?”

“Somebody, I guess Agatha, told me to wait at the scene, and that agents were on the way. And I waited. Flass and the other guy, Bullock, arrived together. Bullock came to talk to me, and Flass remained with the body. Then the circus started, and here we are.”

“You didn't change your clothes?

Bruce opened his arms and pointed at his shirt as if to say, “judge for yourself,” and then he simply said no.

“I may need them.”

“Now? I'm not a prude, but walking home naked doesn't enthrall me that much.”

Jim clenched his teeth against a surge of pure unbridled lust. “This is getting ridiculous,” he thought, more annoyed than ever. For the life of him, he couldn't find a reason why he was lusting over another man at his age.   
His libido had never strayed from the straight and narrow, not since the day Peggy Lee Swanson played the game 'I'll show you mine if you show me yours' with him, and it should be as dormant as a bear in January after the evening's activities with Barbara.   
He cursed himself for letting sex drag his thoughts away from his job, but he realized that probably was the problem all along. He didn’t want to have to deal with what was to come next. He knew Gotham better than the inside of his pockets, and he was on first name basis with most of its residents. He didn’t want to start thinking about which one of them could be a murderer.

Bruce snapped his fingers, bringing Jim's attention back to the here and now.

“You zoned out, sheriff.”

“Yeah. Sorry. Where were we?”

“My clothes?”

“Oh yeah... those. I guess I'll have to send a deputy with you to bring them back.”

“As long as it's not Flass?”

“Why so?”

“I don't trust him, sheriff. He looks like someone who'd spread Napier's blood on them just to frame the murder on me.”

“Why?”

“That's your job to find out. Maybe for the same reason he tugged in and zipped up Napier in the car. You know, after last year I've grown to be a bit paranoid about a lot of things, but I don't buy his story about decency.”

“Neither did I, to be honest,” Jim conceded. “When did you notice Napier's penis out of his trousers?”

“I can't pinpoint the moment. When you asked if something in the scene was different, I just had this image of Napier with his dick hanging out, and then of Flass rummaging around his middle.”

“I guess we'll have more about that when the lab has finished.”

“So, are we done now?” Bruce asked, hopefully.

“Almost. You said you knew Napier already. Tell me about it.”

“Phew!” Bruce sighed, resigned. “Hasn't been a pleasurable experience.”

“How so?”

“Came in the house as if he owned it already, bullied me around a bit, thinking I was going to fold, and got a bit disappointed when I told him to go fly a kite.”

“Jack was known for being a bit too rude,” Jim admitted.

“Must be something in the water, probably.” Bruce scowled at Jim, but not with the fierceness he would have used just half an hour ago.

“Touché,” Jim smiled. The first real, honest smile Bruce had seen on his face since they'd met. He thought it looked good on him and that he should do it more often. The sheriff was like Alfred when he smiled. He looked reassuring. Had the power to make Bruce think that everything was going to be fine.

“So that your only meeting?”

Bruce had to think about it. “If you exclude the casual meetings in main street... Yes. And by then he'd learned to keep his distance.”

“Why?”

“Because I sort of kicked him out of my house.”

“Because of the offer he made for your farm?”

“Yes,” he said, then stopped and started to tap his finger on his lips.   
“Mostly. There was something else that rattled me, but I don't know if it matters.”

“Maybe it matters a lot. Out with it.”

“There was something unsettling in the way he kept ogling at Tim while he was talking with me.”

“What?”

“I may be wrong. Probably I am. I don't have anything to support my gut feelings. I just kept thinking that it was a very lewd way to look at a 12 year-old kid, and every passing moment I felt a stronger urge to throw him out. I tend to be over protective about Dick and Tim.”

Jim narrowed his eyes at Bruce.“ That's huge, even for Jack Napier. And sounds a lot like the motive we were looking for.”

“I know. So we're back to square one. It's been nice to be out of the frying pan for at least thirty seconds. But I didn't kill him now as I didn't kill him when you started questioning me, so I can live with it.”

“Do you mind if I talk with Tim?” Jim asked, jotting on his note book the name Tim Wayne.

“Now?” Bruce spat, incredulous. “It's the middle of the night, for god's sake. And it's Drake, not Wayne?”

“What?”

“The name you've written. It's Drake. I'm just the foster. I didn't adopt him. Yet.”

“Tim Drake? Does he goes by the nickname of TD?”

“Yes. He has a friend here who calls him that way. He says it goes along with JJ.” Bruce tapped his index finger against his lips again, then smiled and looked at the framed picture on the sheriff's desk. Now he remembered why the blond boy in the picture looked familiar.  
“Well, I'll be damned. JJ stands for...”

Jim smiled, too. “James Junior.”

Bruce also remembered why Tim didn't answer the phone and felt suddenly relieved. “The tent. They were going to try it tonight.” Now only Dick wasn't accounted for, but he really could have slept through hundreds of phone rings. He could sleep through thunderstorms and hurricanes if he wanted.

“Yeah. They're camping in my backyard. Babs' watching over them.” Jim nodded.

“So, I guess the woman who called me to ask for the camp out was you wife...”

“Ex wife, but yes. It was her. And I was supposed to call you next to ask if TD can come playing baseball on our team. Jim Jr. is quite adamant about it. TD joins us, or he quits. The kids have gone from zero to best of best friends in no time flat.”

“Yeah, thank God! Shy as he is, I was afraid he was going to suffer during the change from the old to the new school. Instead he's never been better. Guess I'll have to thank your son for befriending him.”

“It goes both ways. Jim Jr. has some issues at school too. He's still small for his age, and other kids, even the ones who were his friends since first grade, were bullying him, but now he doesn't mind anymore...”

They nodded understandingly at each other. Just two fathers talking about their sons and comparing notes. It felt right, normal, and was such a difference from the tension of the beginning, especially knowing they were already on a collision course and were going to meet at some point anyway, without all the mess concerning the Napier's murder.  
They both seemed to reach the same conclusion together, because they both turned serious and pensive at the same time. There was no way to forget about Napier's death for more than few minutes at a time.

“Well, I guess I can let you talk with Tim, after all,” Bruce said, somberly. “I'm sure you won't get anything out of it. I would have noticed if something had upset him lately, and as I told you a moment ago, he's never been better since before the day his father died. But if it serves to prove I didn't have a motive to off Napier, so be it.”

“What if there's something right in what you've picked up from Jack Napier?” Jim pondered aloud. “What if that's a motive for someone else? It would be for me.”

“That's for you to find out. All I can say is that I really hope I was wrong and just too paranoid.”

“With kids around, there is not such a thing like 'too paranoid,' Bruce. May I call you Bruce?”

“I don't see why not. May I call you Jim?”

“Yeah. Sure.”

“May I go home, Jim?”

Jim smiled, another of his authentic smiles and nodded.

“I'll see if Montoya or Bullock are around to give you a lift home and come back with your clothes.” He pressed the button of the intercom and talked with Agatha. Bruce heard her protest the fact that it was already past midnight and she wanted to go home too. Jim assured her he was going to close shop for the night in a matter of minutes. Her answer was pretty much un-lady like, and Jim laughed, while Bruce bit the inside of his mouth to keep from doing the same and let Jim know he was listening.

When Bullock knocked at the door, Bruce was already on his feet, ready to go. He felt tired and cranky, but less hostile about the sheriff. He had the feeling that it was starting to work both ways, thanks probably to their sons' friendship.

“As I told you before, Jim, even if the circumstances aren't exactly ideal, it's been a pleasure to meet you.” He extended his hand, and this time Jim shook it, feeling a lot less threatened by the other man's nearness. Jim was beginning to feel on firmer ground now that their roles were fixed on more manageable terms. They were fathers of kids who were friends to each other. They'd probably wind up being friends too at some point, meeting at their sons' games, drinking beers together from time to time, and watching ball games on TV. Nothing to be worried about.

Wrong.

The moment their hands touched, an electric current, more akin to a seven-megaton blast than a mere spark, shot through them both and pooled some inches below their belts. Their heads turned quickly, and for a startled moment, they stared at one another's eyes. They didn't say a word and didn't make a scene out of the disentangling of their hands, mostly because there was Bullock watching, but their eyes didn't manage to cover the surprise and the following thought, common to them both:   
WHAT THE FUCK!


	8. Chapter 8

Walking inside his house, Bruce flipped on all the switches he encountered, as if the need to chase away the shadows hidden in the darkness had suddenly become compulsory. He'd never been afraid of the dark, but right at that moment he would have flooded the house with all the lightings of the Yankee Stadium and then some. He changed his mind, deciding that maybe darkness was better, when the back porch light revealed the ancient, chest-type freezer with boxes stacked haphazardly on it and the warped wooden floor around it, most of them loaded with useless things he and the boys had yet to unpack since moving.  
The kitchen light illuminated a good-size room that was hung with peeling, nauseating orange and yellow wallpaper in a fruit motif. Dick and Tim had vowed to to take it off and burn it to ashes, for fear it could spread on the walls again.   
The kitchen was a disaster area. He and the boys had spent last Sunday dismantling the cupboards to repair them, but then they'd learned they needed to change half the dry walls beneath them and re-paint the whole room, so now there were things sprawled everywhere.   
No dirty dishes were piled in the stainless-steel sink, which could mean two different things: Dick did them (improbable), or he didn't eat at home (most likely).

“It's hard, the life of the bachelor,” Bruce mumbled, casting a wry look in the direction of Deputy Bullock, who had driven him home, catching him snooping around.

“The clothes,” Bullock said, his cheeks flushing slightly pink, but his posture set in stone in a pose that screamed, 'I don't give a damn if you'd caught me.' “Yes,” Bruce thought. “Definitively, it must be something in the water.”

“Just give me a sec,” he said and walked away only to come back immediately with a bath robe. He undressed, down to his Calvin Klein, in front of the deputy, and then put on the bath robe, fastened it, proceeded to get the briefs off, and put them in the same bag with the rest.   
Bullock put the seals on the bag, signed it with his initials, nodded, and said good night. A moment later Bruce heard the car leaving.  
The silence of the house closed in on him abruptly, like a door slamming. He was alone. He didn't like to be alone, never had. He felt like climbing the stairs and waking up Dick, just to have someone to talk with.

The sound of the screen door slapping against the frame went through him like a gunshot. He wheeled and bolted back against the counter. Instinctively, he reached for something to protect himself with. His fingers closed on the handle of a steak knife. He pulled the knife up in front of him as the kitchen door swung open, and Dick ambled in.

“Shit,” the boy screamed, eyes lighting on the knife. “I know I'm late, but I don't think it's crime worth a death sentence,” he concluded, laughing at Bruce, who hastily put the knife back on the counter.

“You scared away ten years of my life!” He accused Dick. “A man was killed just down the road from here tonight.”

Dick blinked, then yawned. “I didn’t kill him,” he said blandly. His gaze slid pointedly to Bruce's hand. “Did you?”   
Dick had never been one to betray his feelings with his expression. Nothing seemed to disturb him. Nothing emotional seemed to stick on him as if his outer shell was made of layers of Teflon. He used to say that, “living in a circus, nothing gets to you after a while,” but Bruce was sure it was all part of the same defensive mechanism Dick used against the world since the day his parents were killed, sabotaged during the most important passage of the 'Flying Greysons' act.   
He understood Dick better than most, but sometimes he wished the four years they'd spent together and the therapy had helped him to come out of his shell.   
With Tim it had been easier. Maybe because Tim was younger, or maybe because his dad had died of illness, so there was no one to exact vengeance upon, as there was no one to blame for a defective tire.  
Dick, instead, had let his guard and his 'untouchable' act down just once in four years; the day his parents' killer was sentenced to life without parole, and just because he'd wanted the death penalty.

“No,” Bruce answered. “I'm just the one who found the body. Been at the sheriff's station till now.”

Dick laughed again. “The usual Wayne's luck. Who's the dead man?”

“Jack Napier.”   
If the name caught Dick's interest, Bruce didn't noticed. If anything, he seemed even more detached, and surely bored.

Bruce decided to let go and try something else. “You were supposed to be home at eleven. What have you been doing?”

“Nothing exceptional,” Dick conceded. His broadening shoulders gave a dismissive shrug, and absent-mindedly, he started to rummage in the pockets of his faded jeans. He was still a couple of inches shorter than Bruce, but he had been a gymnast since his time in the circus. All his muscles made him look huge and intimidating. Bruce guessed that was one of the reasons why bullies had stopped harassing Jim Gordon, Jr. Nobody, in a sane state of mind, would harass the 'little brother' of such a 'beast' and his best friend, especially after he'd took down the captain of the wrestling team without breaking a sweat during his first P.E. Lesson in the new school.

“I took Tim to JJ's, and then I went to eat something in town.” Dick added.

“To take this long, you must have eaten a whole cow.”

“Went to the Inter-net Point.”

“Again?”

“Yeah. Again. What's wrong with that?”

“We have the broadband here, in case you didn't notice.”

“We also have boxes everywhere, the ugliest wallpaper this side of the equator, peeling and cracking dry walls, and that smell of dead rat we don't seem able to eradicate.”

Dick saw Bruce's expression getting somber; the first sign he was on the verge of turning into the brooding mop, who, too often, felt the need to apologize for bringing Tim and him there, so he backpedaled quickly.

“Tim made me promise not to touch the dry walls without him, so there was no reason to come back here quickly. And don't take this too personally, but the boobs of the clerk at the Inter-net Point beat your scowling face 24/7.”

“I tried to call you.”

Still totally unfazed, Dick took the cell phone out of his pocket, switched it on, and let the beeps signaling the missing calls go, one after another.  
“Oops!” he smiled unrepentant. “You're right. Here you are... and again... and again... and again... and again... Wow! You really needed to speak to me.”

“Perceptive as usual, Sherlock.”

“Oh, well. Nobody's dead. Except the dead man, of course. Do you mind if I go to bed? I'm a bit tired.”

Bruce bit his tongue and crossed his arms over his chest to keep from walking up to Dick and shaking him. He felt like screaming, “for God's sake, feel something,” but he knew it wasn't the right thing to do.   
Dick felt things. The therapist had told him more than once that Dick's attachment to him, Tim, and Alfred was real and honest, as well as the hate for his parents' killer and the aversion for Selina Kyle.   
The shrink always said those were huge steps forward and that, in time, the boy would come the whole way out of his self built cage.   
Bruce doubted it. Edward Nigma, with his anemic looks and candy-striped bow ties, had always struck him as being a 'banana short of a full fruit salad,' so to speak. But the Social Services wanted him as a condition to keep the fostering program going, so he had to be good for something.

“Stop thinking about Doctor Nigma,” Dick went on, while walking toward the stairs, taking Bruce by surprise.

“Do I have a doctor Nigma's face now?” he had to ask.

“Of course... It's just a tad different from your 'I need to get the kids out of this shit as soon as possible' face,” Dick's smile was mocking, but in a good kind of way. “Bruce. Try to get it in that head of yours that I'm fine. Tim is fine. And you're going to be fine, too. We're going to make this....” and he made an encompassing gesture to indicate the whole house, “...our home. We're going to make it.”

“You're bullshitting me, you know that?”

“Who, me? Naahhh!” He ran up the stairs with his characteristic 'I don't give a fuck' way of walking, which meant, and Bruce was sure of it, he was hiding something in his usual way. All that remained to find out was what exactly he was hiding and why.

-*-

Dick's room was no better than the rest of the house. On the second floor, it overlooked the cornfield their sharecropper farmed, and past that, their neighbors' pen full of cows. When the wind was in the wrong direction, the smell was awful.  
The window needed a huge repairing, and the mosquitoes and gnats swarmed in through a rip in the screen to congregate at the light bulb sticking out of the ceiling.   
Dick put on his headphones and flicked on his stereo, letting the AC-DC's new album attempt, with all its might, to break through his eardrums. He flopped belly up across his bed, his head dangling off the other edge, and his gaze riveted to one particular spot a couple of inches on the right side of the window.  
He imagined a tiny spot there. A micro-metric black hole able to suck away all his distress and his anger. It wasn't a trick he'd learned from Nigma. It was how his mother had gotten rid of the anxieties of the life in the circus and found the concentration necessary to climb 10 meters of ladder and fly from trapeze to trapeze, knowing there was no net below.   
It was good she'd taught him that trick, Dick decided, because he felt such a strong urge to push down that hole all the hate that was consuming him.   
He hated Gotham. Hated the way it looked. Hated the way it smelled. Hated everything about it. Hated the way the locals looked at him as though he were from the fucking moon. Hated how they laughed behind his back and those of the people he loved.   
Back in the city, nobody would have dared to laugh at them. They’d lived in the penthouse of Wayne Tower. Dick had had a closet bigger than this bedroom. He’d had a wall of bookshelves and a big desk with his own computer. He and Tim were like princes William and Henry, and the Wayne's name meant money and influence. It didn’t mean anything in Gotham, but that they were strangers and outcasts.   
Gothamites thought Bruce was a stupid, rich jerk who had deserved everything that happened to him. They all wouldn't be able to reach far enough to tie Bruce's sneakers, standing on tiptoes on the tip of mount Everest, but they all felt entitled to judge, to say that Selina was the smart one, that Morris was the cool one. Like that jerk, Napier. He'd been the louder voice in the chorus, always deriding, always offending, always looking at them as if they were hobos.   
Dick had wished on him the same painful death he kept wishing upon both Morris and Selina and now that the jerk was dead for real, all he could think about was that he really, really hoped his curses were catching.   
He hated Morris Grant so much it hurt, and that was nothing compared to the hate he felt for Selina. Bruce had trusted her. He had trusted her. Tim had trusted her even more. And she'd stabbed them all in the back. He could have been forgiving for the pain she'd inflicted on him, but for what she did to Bruce, and even more for how much she'd hurt Tim, she deserved to die. He wanted to be the one taking her life, a bit at a time, slowly and painfully.

He'd spent the night, like several others before that, surfing the net, looking for clues about the bitch's whereabouts. He'd searched the gossip columns, the little headlines nobody used to read, everything that looked strange and could be related to her. Once he'd managed to link one of her stupid, cruel post cards with a picture of her taken on a yacht in Bahia, but when had that happened another post card had arrived already. So now he was trying to anticipate her movements. To find where she was hiding, before the next post card arrived, because Alfred had told him there was a scheme in those post cards. They were all sent from airports, probably while she was leaving the place.   
He knew he was chasing wind mills, but he couldn't help it as he couldn't avoid the anger that burned and roiled in his guts. He felt it more and more lately, eating away at him, churning his insides.   
Sometimes he just wanted to explode with it, screaming and fighting. But he reined it in and stamped it down, as he’d always done with his feelings. It didn’t pay to let people see what you felt. They turned it against you more often than not. Better to show nothing.   
He couldn’t seem to keep himself from getting mad, but he was working on it. Sometimes it scared him, the way he felt, so full of fury and rage at the injustices that had all but ruined his, Bruce's, and Tim's life. But most of the time he controlled it, the way his father had taught him. The way a man should. He didn’t let it show, and that was the important thing.   
Don’t get mad, get even. That was what his father used to say. He said it aloud once again, testing the sound of it on his ears, then he took his swiss knife from his pocket, opened it, weighted it on his hand, and threw it with all his might against the point where he had posed his 'black hole.'   
The blade sank in the dry wall almost to the hilt. Dick imagined that the dry wall was Selina and felt better already.

He tried to imagine what Alfred would say of his habit to throw knives against walls and smiled.  
“Master Richard...” He felt the old man's voice as if it was right next to him. “I will not challenge the cathartic effect of a good knife thrown with the right amount of force against a well selected target, but I'm sure that, if we try, we can find other ways to channel all that energy...”  
“Good old Alfred. How much I miss you,” Dick mused, and suddenly, a chill went through his spine.   
“Oh, boy,” He whispered, getting rid of the headphones as if they were fastidious mosquitoes. He started to search for his cell phone, avoiding switching on the light in case Bruce was still up.  
That afternoon he'd lent his cell phone to Tim. Tim never needed the cell phone before. Never used it. Why did he need it that afternoon? Not to call JJ since the other kid was next to Tim when he asked. Then why?   
“No... No... No... NO... Tim... tell me you haven't...” Dick mumbled, scrolling down calls and messages until he found the message he didn't want to find.   
There it was. The message to Alfred saying “We miss you so much, Alfred. Bruce's too stubborn to admit it, but we can really use your help. HUGS!!! Timothy.”

“Damn,” Dick cursed. “Bruce's gonna skin us alive”

Of course Tim was perfectly right. With Bruce working 24/7 to get back in the business, he and Tim trying to fit in the new school, and the house in the condition it was, they needed Alfred more than anything, but Dick was sure that Bruce wasn't ready to admit it, yet. And if Bruce took that as another personal failure, they were all screwed.  
Deciding it was too late for a call, Dick typed all his concerns in a message and sent it to Alfred, stressing the part about Bruce still not ready to ask for help. He didn't ask Alfred not to come, but he told him to invent a believable excuse, something that didn't hurt Bruce's feelings.  
Surprisingly, seeing the hour, the answer arrived just a minute later.  
It said, “Master Richard, don't worry. I've got the perfect excuse to come.”

Dick fell asleep with a smile on his face and the feeling that something good was going to happen, finally.


	9. Chapter 9

Jim Gordon stood on his front porch, nursing a beer and staring off toward the old Kane's place. Weariness ached through him, and pain pinched his bum knee like a clamp. He thought about going to the backyard and seeing if the kids were alright, but decided not to. It was too late, and there was the risk of waking up the dogs, and consequentially, every life form in the ranch.   
He tipped his bottle back and let the cold liquid slide down a throat that was raw from barking orders at his deputies and the press, and he thought he was really tired.

They had worked at Gotham until after one in the morning. The BCI agents had still been there, sniffing around like lazy old dogs, when Jim had left the station. Napier had been carted off to the funeral home for the night. His car had been towed to Gotham County’s impound lot. The mobile lab had packed up and taken the evidence they’d found to the vault of the bank. Work at the scene had ended, but the real work was just beginning. Jim figured he’d grab some hours' sleep, then return to his office and start trying to find a killer with what information they had.   
He almost managed to laugh at the lunacy of that. What did he know about finding killers? Nothing more than what he’d read in textbooks. The worst things that had ever happened in his tenure as sheriff had been some Friday night brawls at 'Beers and Bowling,' some illegal distilleries found hidden in some barns, and some cases of burglary. There was a class of social lowlifes who dealt pot and pills to one another. But for the most part, law and orderliness was bred into the folks of his county.  
Jim wondered if he was up to the task of catching a murderer. He was a good sheriff. Whatever people’s reasons for voting for him, they had been getting their money’s worth up to this point. He ran a tight county, and he kept crime to a minimum. Until tonight. Now he would be put to the test. Now he would have to prove that he hadn’t gotten this job because he was a decorated soldier and the (ex) consort of the local queen bee.

He would do it, he vowed, pushing the doubts aside. He would catch this killer. He would win because winning was the one thing he had always done best. He wouldn’t tolerate a loss. Neither would the good folk of Gotham County.

He’d done the right thing, calling in the BCI. The lab boys had swarmed over the scene like ants at a picnic, dusting everything in sight for fingerprints, taking video and still pictures, making plaster casts of tire tracks, measuring blood spatters, and scraping samples into plastic bags. They had vacuumed Napier's Lincoln and would sift through the debris for trace evidence that might make or break the case. Their efficiency was an awesome thing to behold, Jim reflected, taking another long pull on his beer.   
Tomorrow they would ship the body off to the medical examiner in the city, where a team of pathologists would determine the cause of death. Not that there was much question about it. Gotham County’s coroner, Doc Tompkins, had neither the equipment nor the inclination to handle a detailed autopsy for a murder investigation. She would, as a matter of courtesy, duty, and principle, ride along in the hearse from the Funeral Home and stand in on the procedure, but she had told Jim she was more than happy to be relegated to the role of witness this time around.

Witness. The word brought to mind a clear image of Bruce Wayne sitting in his office, pale, shaking, brown eyes glazed with tears as he associated the actual corpse to that of his father and relived that old horror. Jim swore under his breath. For a moment there, he had wanted to reach out and hug the younger man, to offer comfort. He tossed back the last of his beer and set the empty on the porch rail as he looked across the pasture and woods that lay between his house and the old Kane's place. No question about it, Wayne was becoming, in his mind, another of his strays, somebody to look out for, like the less strong comrades in his unit, or the kids in high school who everybody knocked around.   
That he could handle. What really confused him was the sudden need to connect with Wayne at a higher level, which was totally another beast to handle. Need was something he didn’t like to think about right now, or want to associate with another man in general, Bruce Wayne in particular.   
Just a few hours ago, while in bed with Barbara, he was sure he was perfectly satisfied with his life the way it was. Now, he wasn't sure of anything anymore, and so far, he had adamantly refused to tackle the other hairy aspect of his actual confusion: the sudden, unwanted, unexpected sexual tension.

“Dad?”

Jim turned; big, goofy smile appearing automatically on his face as often happened when Jim Jr. or Babs were around.   
Babs stood at the front door, her long red hair in disarray around her shoulders, one of Jim's 'Gotham Sheriff department' jerseys hanging to her knees.  
She blinked at him sleepily and wandered onto the porch to snuggle against him. Jim slid an arm around her and leaned his cheek against the top of her head, breathing deep the scents of Teen Spirit and shampoo.

“What are you doing up this late?” he asked softly.

“I didn't hear you come home,” she smiled at him as if she thought he was a dear for asking, but bordering on senility for not getting it by himself.

“I went to check on JJ and TD,” she concluded solemnly like a grown up, reliable, and conscientious young woman who took seriously her duties as babysitter (and wanted to prove she was responsible enough to get a driving license and a car).

“Hmm . . . How are they? ”

“Asleep, I think. Guess they've finally stopped talking since the last time I checked. Bingo, Buster, Snook, and Spot are sleeping around the tent, so I guess they're as safe as they can get for the night,” Babs smiled.

“Jimmy's still trying to sell TD on the legend of the Bat-man?” Jim couldn't keep from grinning at the idea.

Jim didn't know where his son had picked up the idea of the spirit of an ancient Shaman who possessed virtuous men and changed them into creatures half men and half bats to fight the forces of evil, but he knew Jim Jr. was as devoted to his 'legend of the Bat-man' as Linus Van Pelt was of the Great Pumpkin.   
He'd tried to find acolytes since he was in second grade, and at least two times a years he'd gone in the woods in search of the elusive cemetery where the Shaman's spirit should reside. After the third time JJ had scared his mother out of her wits, Barbara had declared the Bat-man officially outlaw and banned it from her house. Jim, instead, had opted for a softer solution. He started to accompany his son on his searches for the elusive cemetery and gained, in exchange, the title of most probable candidate to become a Bat-man if the evil ever came to menace Gotham, and a son who kept bringing home A+ in creative writing from school.

“I think TD had bought the idea already, Dad. Tonight they were comparing notes to decide who was more fit to take the mantle of the bat between you and Mr. Wayne,” Babs laughed.

“Who won?”

“I think they came to the conclusion that the Shaman's spirit can choose two men at a time and make them fight side by side if the challenge requires it.”

“Very democratic.” Jim tried to imagine himself with a pair of giant bat wings, flying over the county, but all he came up with was the coyote from loony tunes with the green bat suit. He told Babs and they laughed companionably. For a moment everything seemed to be as it used to before the violent death of Jack Napier had shattered the illusory normalcy of Gotham. It didn't last.

“Did someone really get murdered tonight?” Babs asked, her voice soft with a touch of fear.

“Yeah,” Jim murmured. “Someone did.”

She shivered delicately against him and tightened her arms around his waist, pressing her cheek against his chest. “I didn’t think anything like that would ever happen here.”

Jim stared over her head, across the dark expanse of countryside to the south, toward the old Kane's place and Gotham, and he felt the heaviness of evil in the air. He thought that maybe the county really needed a Bat-man in a time like this. Maybe he should have looked harder for that Indian cemetery.

“Neither did I, sweetheart,” he whispered.

“Do you know who did it?”

“No, but I’ll find out.” He tipped her chin up with his forefinger. “It’s on my list of things to do, right after tucking you in.”

Bab's rolled her eyes. “Dad, I am sixteen, you know. I’m too old to be tucked in.”

“No way,” he scoffed. “You’re not more than ten. It wasn’t a week ago you were throwing up baby formula on me.”

“That's gross!”

“Really?” Jim propped his hands on his hips and gave her a look of challenge as she stepped back from him. “Wanna bet I can still carry you upstairs?”

“Oh, no,” she said, giggling and holding her hands up to fend him off as she backed across the porch toward the door. “No, no, you don’t.”

It was a ritual they had gone through since she had turned ten and decided she had outgrown the piggyback ride. One day, Jim mused, Babs would be genuinely too old for it, but it damn well wasn’t going to be tonight. Too many other aspects of his life seemed suddenly threatened by change; his daughter wasn’t going to grow up on him tonight too.

He cut off her route to the door, keeping his eyes on hers, bending down, hands up, ready to catch her or block her.

“Dad, I mean it,” Babs said, trying to look stern. “You’ll hurt yourself.”

“That does it,” Jim growled.

He feinted left, then bolted right, catching her as she tried to slip past him. She squealed a protest as he swung her up in his arms, her long hair and long legs flying as he held her against his chest. They were both laughing when Bingo, Buster, Snook, and Spot came out of the dark, barking.

“Oops... Cavalry's coming to help you, princess,” Jim laughed, watching the dogs stop abruptly a few feet from him. They were really protective about young Barbara (for a reason Jim couldn't fathom, not one of his dogs liked the older Barbara), but he was the one feeding them, so they were pretty confused about what to do.   
Jim made a sign to them to go back in the backyard, and the dogs obeyed. Then he stepped sideways through the door and strode across the living room with its soft beige carpet and sturdy masculine furnishings. He turned his concentration to making it to the second floor of the house.   
Halfway toward the the stairs he was reminded of the cruel reality that he wasn't as young as he wanted to be. Pain clutched at his knee, and he tried to bite back a grimace without much success.   
He tried to make another step, but the knee gave away, and he fell, thankfully, on the couch.

Babs looked at him and frowned. “We’re both too old for this, Dad.”

“Yeah, I guess you're right,” he groaned as he tried to adjust his leg on the couch without moving Babs from his arms. “I'm getting too old for a lot of things, lately.”

Jim sighed and scratched at a mosquito bite on his neck. “I guess your brother's Shaman will have to find someone else.”

“The bat-man flies. You don't need your knee for that.” Babs tried to cheer him up.

“Of course you need it. Try to land on just one leg...” he smiled back at her.

“Don't worry, Dad. JJ will find a solution for that, too.”

“So you think I can still be the Bat-man?”

“Of course you can,” Babs nodded vigorously. “But no green bat-suit, ok?”

“Deal!”

They remained silent for a while, Babs moving her weight away from her dad, and Jim massaging uselessly his knee. When Babs spoke again, Jim felt as if a ton of bricks had just fallen on him.

“Have you see mom today?” She asked, and there was no doubt about what she meant with 'see.'

Jim nodded almost shamefully. Christ, he thought, the whole damn world was shifting beneath his feet tonight. He'd never thought that that aspect of his personal life was going to bring up issues in his relationship with his daughter.

“She's using you like the spare tire, Dad,” Babs stated, as serious as an IRS agent. Jim nodded and mouthed a silent, 'I know.'

“Why do you allow her to use you like that?”

“Well, that's a loaded question,” Jim told himself without giving voice to it. “How do you explain to your sixteen years old daughter that a good shag, from time to time, is better than nothing?”

“Do you want to get back with her?”

Jim shook his head no, still not trusting his voice.

“So why don't you try to find someone else?”

He shook it off and forced a grin. “Who could put up with me?”

Babs shrugged and slid her arms around his waist, her face earnest and somber as she rested her chin against his chest and stared up at him. “You're always too hard on yourself, Dad. I know you'd just have to snap your fingers...”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence, sweetheart, but you're related, so you're partial on the matter.” Jim dropped a kiss on her forehead and gently pushed her, and her subject of discussion, away. “Go to bed, Babsy. It’s late.”

Babs bit her lip and looked entirely too perceptive and sympathetic, too wise to be a child. “I wish you weren’t so alone, Dad,” Babs said softly.   
She backed toward the stairs and her room, looking frustrated, as if she had a lot more to say but knew this wasn’t the time to say it.

“Good night, Dad,” she said with a sigh of resignation.

“’Night, Sweetheart.”

Jim adjusted his position on the couch, looking up the stairs until the beam of light shining out from under Babs' door went out.   
He felt like death warmed over. His daughter had just told him that his 'perfectly ordered' life was a fake and a mess. His knee had just reminded him that he wasn't as strong and fit as he pretended to be. His county had just fallen off fairy lands and dropped unceremoniously into the muds of reality in the worst possible way.   
He fell asleep on the couch, thinking that nothing was the same anymore, and he wasn't sure he'd be able to keep up with all those changes.


	10. Chapter 10

Jim knew he was dreaming.   
He was dreaming of flying over Gotham County with long, wide, beautiful wings, translucent and black, soft as silk, strong as steel. The wind on his face was inebriating; riding the currents, from the most feeble to the devastatingly strong, made him feel fearless and mighty. Nothing happening to the puny creatures beneath him could escape his control. He could fly higher than the eagles and still see the ants among the grass. He didn't need glasses. He didn't feel pain in his leg or his back. He could see the evil wherever it was hidden and dive on it faster than the speed of thought. He was the master of the sky. He was the Bat-man.

Out of the blue, he felt a wave of lust hit him. There was no build up, no tingling of change. One moment he felt fine, and then the next, he felt like he was about to explode. He grabbed his crotch in a vain attempt to stop what was happening, but the touch of his hand only made it worse.   
He didn't know how, but knew what it was. He'd never experienced it before, but he recognized the call and the power behind it. It was time to help a new Bat-man into this world, to share the mantle with another knight, and to feed his energy with the new chosen paladin. It was time to mate.   
He landed among the trees beneath the ruins of the never completed resort, noiseless and invisible. He folded his bat shaped wings around him like a cloak, listened to the many voices of the night, and waited.

His nose filled with the smell of the new comer. It was as if he stood right next to him already, and it was pleasant. Jim's tongue came out and began to lick eagerly at his lips. A moan escaped, and his sex swelled up painfully. Never in his life had he felt this way.  
He turned his back to the tree, leaned against it, and did his best to calm himself down, but the adrenaline was running high in his limbs. His hands grasped the tree behind him, his clawed fingers tearing away chunks of wood as if it was wet paper. His mouth felt painfully dry, and it seemed as if his whole body was charged with lust.

Jim froze. Tendrils of wispy blue energy flowed out of the darkness and reached him, calling out the deep red glow of his aura. Red and blue tendrils played together, chasing each other in the air, interlacing and swirling, merging and fusing in a blinding cascade of purple light. Jim's inner bat rejoiced at the sight of such a display of energy. The new beast was going to be a powerful one, just like him. Jim folded his wings behind his back, exposed his chest, and launched a calling shriek toward the source of the blue beams that seemed to say, “come, young bat. Come and end my loneliness.”

Then the man appeared, stunned and groggy as if mesmerized. Jim smiled approvingly. He knew it had to be him. In the county, no one else but Jim, had ever answered to the call of the Bat; no one else but him, had proved himself worthy of the wings. It couldn't be a local. It couldn't be anyone else but Bruce Wayne.

-*-

Bruce knew he was dreaming.  
He was so sure of it that even in the dream he pouted and said, “I must be dreaming.”  
The fact that his dreaming self was a big, black wolf left few doubts about his suspicions.   
He was in the dept of the forest, running up and down the grassy area that separated the woods from the quite still river, jumping around playfully, dipping his paws happily into the cool water, and splashing around like a carefree puppy. Suddenly, he stopped and looked up at the full moon. His nostrils flared out, and his ears stood up. He watched closely, his massive head swinging to the woods every so often to locate the faceless threat that his senses had spotted already.   
The other wolf, with the white-grayish fur, came out of the darkness and howled at him and at the moon. He looked older than Bruce, and bigger. He was scarred on his side, and he had darker patches of fur on the forehead and around the eyes. To the wolf that was Bruce it seemed like the old alpha was wearing a mask, or glasses.  
They started to circle each other, growling menacingly, studying how to get the upper hand and take down the adversary.  
The black wolf that was Bruce instinctively recognized the power exuding from the older wolf as if he had tasted it already. He knew they were evenly matched. He knew there was no way to know beforehand who was going to win, but he wanted the challenge, and the gray wolf seemed to want it too. Every single growl coming from the old pack leader seemed to mock him.  
“Come on, cub. Show me what you got,” it seemed to say.   
Bruce was simply more than happy to oblige.   
He moved, teeth bared, and jumped. The gray wolf parried his attack and snapped his powerful jaws, aiming to Bruce's neck. Bruce avoided the bite, but barely.  
“Let's see if we're of the same league, cub,” the gray wolf growled. Then he leaped, so high and so fast that Bruce almost missed the movement. His heavy paws hit the ground with his great weight, and he started to run.   
Bruce sprinted after him, feeling alive like never before.  
The old wolf (Bruce didn't know why, but he was sure its name was Jim) was so fast and so powerful, it was scary.   
Bruce saw him far in the distance heading toward the woods. He dug his thick paws into the earth, and he felt his massive muscles surge and propel his body forward with blinding speed.   
He ran up to the first trees only moments after the older wolf disappeared behind them. He used all his vision could give him to scan the area for signs of the older wolf. He thought he would see broken limbs and clear prints in the earth, but there was nothing. His ears lifted up, and he listened for the sound of the other alpha, but there was only silence. Finally he breathed in the air, and he found the gray wolf. He had the feeling the other wolf had purposefully let him catch his sweet and earthy scent.

Bruce moved like a wolf possessed. Branches snapped off, and the ground was crushed under his massive feet as he ran after the other wolf. He finally caught sight of him and surged ahead. The old gray was moving like a ghost. He barely made a sound as his body seemed to mold itself to the surroundings. He was jumping in the air and using the trees to springboard himself forward. When he did hit the ground, it was as if the forest itself helped to conceal his presence. No twigs snapped, and no bushes rustled. The older wolf never stumbled or crashed into anything. It was amazing just to watch him move, and Bruce knew he couldn't and shouldn't win against him. He was nothing more than an overgrown cub compared to the old pack leader, and there was still so much he could, and should, learn from him.  
When Bruce made it to the clearing, the old gray that was Jim was already there looking up at the moon in silent communication. When he turned toward Bruce, his gray fur shined like pure silver in the moonlight. To Bruce, the old wolf looked ageless, supernatural.   
“So, cub, How's it gonna be?”   
Bruce would have smiled had he been human. Instead he locked eyes with the older wolf and bared his throat in surrender.  
The moon, at the peak of its fullness, shined brighter over the two wolves, and they started to change.

-*-

As the Bat-man, Jim knew instinctively what to do. He knew that he had to offer his power to the younger bat, but he'd been the Bat-man for so long that even if the beast in him knew what to do, the man wasn't sure if it was right. Bruce was going to be the first Bat-man he was going to sire, and the man had no idea what that really meant.   
He stood there, frozen in place, almost terrified by the power running through and around him and the new bat.   
Bruce took over. The younger man's hands reached out and ripped apart Jim's T- shirt, baring his chest. He stepped forward and felt the muscles of the Bat-man's stomach, then moved up to his large pecs, gripping them with a strength that he shouldn't have possessed in his still human form.   
Jim surveyed the youngster's movements, but did nothing to stop him.  
Bruce moved his hands all over Jim's sinewy torso and his strong shoulders, squeezing them as if testing their strength.   
Jim stood there while the soon to be born Bat-man explored his body.   
The younger man moved up and down each arm, gripping the biceps at each pass.   
He ran his hands around the Bat-man's waist and pulled at him as if to pick him up. Jim didn't budge a inch and this seemed to please Bruce to no end.   
The beast was slightly insulted that he had to go through this test. He was the Bat-man, after all. A thick rumble boiled in his chest and ran up his throat, filling the air with a bass like sound. Bruce looked up, and his eyes actually flashed with approval.   
Jim felt his large muscles swell up, daring the younger man to test him further. He glared at Bruce in challenge, and Bruce didn't disappoint. He put one hand between Jim's legs and squeezed the heavy bulge between them. Now the beast in Jim responded fully, and a loud shriek erupted out of the Bat-man's throat. Bruce looked up, still not speaking, and openly gripped the older man's mound. The Bat shrieked in challenge, his big shoulders bunching up, and his neck flaring out.  
Bruce's hand ran around the thick bulge between Jim's legs, and Jim's cock swelled up in response. Bruce's fingers sunk into the mound with all his strength but the big dick between the man's legs pushed back with equal power.   
Bruce glanced up at him, and Jim snarled with smug confidence.   
Bruce's other hand moved to join the first one, and he leaned forward and began to lick at the center of Jim's chest.   
Jim watched Bruce take long licks between his pecs, as the beast in the younger man tasted him for the first time. He bent his neck down and began to sniff at the beast scraping the surface of the young man's body, getting the new scent memorized for all time in his mind.   
Bruce ignored him and ran his tongue over of Jim's chest, stopping briefly to suck on each nipple.

Bruce nudged at one of Jim's arms with his face, and Jim lifted up his arm  
to allow access. Bruce's tongue swiped at Jim's furry armpit, and a  
groan of pure lust escaped both mouths. Jim put his mouth next to Bruce's ear and cried in approval as the new bat-man lapped hungrily at his flesh.   
Bruce moved back to the man's chest and sucked hard at his nipple in an attempt  
to feed the beast emerging inside him. He moved his head slowly to the  
other side, licking first at the center of Jim's chest again and then  
at his other nipple. Finally he worked his way to the other arm and Jim raised it without any prompting. Bruce licked and lathered Jim's pit with his spit and Jim found himself moaning at the feel of the young man's warm tongue.

Bruce's hands never left the throbbing mound between Jim's legs, but his  
fingers began to squeeze with increasing urgency. He went from simply  
enjoying the weight of Jim's crotch to almost clawing at it frantically.   
When he pulled himself away from Jim's armpit, he looked down at his busy hands and gave them all his attention. Jim watched as well, letting Bruce take the lead in the most important day of his life.

Bruce's fingers pulled at the fly of Jim's slacks and tugged from side to side trying to get them to open. Then Bruce's beast did something unexpected. He pulled back one arm and struck the Bat-man with the back of his hand, right across the face.  
Jim was unaffected by the blow, but his inner beast reacted. He lifted up both arms in a threatening posture and screamed right in Bruce's face.   
Bruce stepped back and struck him again. A wave of energy spilled from Jim to Bruce, exploding around them, burning to ashes the tree behind Jim's back and the grass at their feet.

Jim crouched down, his hands splayed to claw, and roared like a lion in anger. Bruce ignored the Bat-man's rage and leaped up to hug the man with his arms and legs. His legs gripped the man's waist while his arms wrapped themselves around his broad shoulders. Bruce pushed his mouth against Jim's neck and he started to lick him frantically.

Jim couldn't take it any longer. He reached under Bruce's shirt until one hand was firmly on the youngster's bare skin, and then he took hold of the  
shirt with his other hand and ripped it off his back. He threw it to  
the ground, and as if in response, Bruce tore the remaining garment from  
Jim's back as well. The Bat-man took a handful of Bruce's black hair  
and pulled him back with one strong tug. He opened his mouth and began to  
lick at the the other man's smooth face over and over again. Bruce kept still and allowed it, and when the thick tongue moved in front of him, Bruce eagerly took it in his mouth and started to suck on it.  
Jim held him still and pushed his big tongue as far into his mouth as he could, while Bruce snaked his own tongue around, challenging the Bat-man to give more.   
And then it happened. Bruce let out his very first Bat-man's shriek.  
Jim shrieked back in answer, knowing the beast in the younger man was ready to come forth. The new Bat-man was going to enter the world. He spread his wings to their full extension and took off, still carrying the new Bat-man in his arms, still ravaging his mouth with all his might.  
The light in Bruce's eyes became brighter, his skin started to glow, and the pressure of his muscles under the skin increased exponentially.  
With his clawed fingers Jim slashed Bruce's back from the nape to buttocks, and a pair of wings, glowing with power and as black as the night, spread out tentatively.  
Jim took advantage of Bruce's shock to disentangle from him and let him fall.  
He watched the newly born Bat-man fall, too stunned to realize he had start moving those beautiful wings or die. He prepared himself to dive and catch the youngster before he killed himself, but Bruce's wings spread in all their powerful glory and the fall became a neck-breaking ascension. Bruce reached Jim and, without stopping, grabbed him with his brand new claws, and together they kept flying higher and higher, reaching peaks Jim had never imagined were possible.  
Clutching each other as tightly as possible, sealed together, chest against chest, groin against groin, hardness against hardness, they folded their wings at the same time and dived in free fall, screaming joyously. Then, always at the same time, they spread their wings again and spiraled up as if in a whirlwind.  
They kept playing in the sky, taming the power they had unleashed, never breaking contact or stop kissing each other except for the time necessary to breath.   
When Jim realized he was about to come in his tattered pants, and Bruce was shuddering and moaning in his arms, he knew for sure that what they were doing wasn't playing at all, but making love.

-*-

They were still wolves, but looking like men now. Naked men.   
Bruce moved forward, still offering his neck to the older wolf, now a middle-aged man with gray hair, thick mustache, and a muscular body.  
Jim opened his mouth and bit, sinking his razor sharp teeth in Bruce's neck and scratching his skin.   
Bruce held still and made no move to get away. It was an act of trust on both sides. The Alpha could have killed the younger animal, ripping his sleek neck open, but the black wolf had showed submission and obedience in offering his life to the Alpha. The bond between them was sealed.  
Jim let go of Bruce's neck, and he looked proudly at his mark on the neck of the other fur-less, human shaped, wolf.   
Bruce raised his head, looked at Jim and very slowly licked his face. He lathered Jim with his tongue, from the forehead to the hollow of his neck, leaving nothing behind, not even his mustache. Jim's growls died in his chest, and he tried not to reciprocate. He was, after all, the Alpha and alphas were to be served. Then he watched the moon and howled something that sounded like, “the hell with it,” and started to lick Bruce's cheeks, nose, and mouth.   
Bruce became more frantic in his lapping, and he began to nudge his face  
against Jim's. He worked his body inside the Alpha's arms and  
shifted his frame until their chests were touching, their legs intertwined, their swelling sexes pressed against each other.  
The scent of mating filled the air.   
Jim pushed his weight against Bruce, and they slid down on the grass, still rubbing against each other with increasing frenzy, still growling in each other's ear with lustful rumbles.   
Their eyes met, and the old gray wolf almost grinned at the younger black one, and blessed by the full moon that had changed them into their human forms, they mated.

-*-

Jim couldn't remember ever waking up so painfully hard.   
The details of the dream were fading away rapidly, but not his need to get release and soon.   
As if in trance, he hid himself in the bathroom, pushed down his pants, and stepped out of them, standing naked from the belt down in front of the mirror. He looked flushed, feverish, and monstrously aroused. For a moment, he contemplated masturbation as a solution, but decided he was too old for that, so he opted for the always reliable cold shower.  
In the end, he had to admit that he probably wasn't too old for a round of five against one, and almost unwillingly, he had to literally take the matter in hand and beat the traitorous appendage into submission.   
Afterward, he felt so embarrassed that he put on a clean uniform, padded down the stairs, and slipped out of the house soundlessly, locking the door behind him. He had a murder to solve, he told himself, and there was no reason to wait to get started.

-*-

Bruce lay trembling on his bed, his strong body vibrating with the lust ripping through him. He couldn't remember the dream, but he knew it was one of the hottest he'd ever had.  
He gripped his prick in his hands and pumped it up and down just a couple of times. His back arched high in the air, and he came, biting his lips to keep himself from moaning loudly.  
He took in several deep breaths to calm down and looked up at the night sky, trying vainly to bring back some images from the dream.  
All he managed to remember was an image of two wolves, one black and one gray, circling each other and showing their bared teeth. He had to wonder what something like that had to do with sex and excitement, but the answer eluded him.


	11. Chapter 11

Before he moved to the country, Bruce Wayne thought that dawn was a novelist's invention, like Jules Verne's giant squids. The first blow to his erroneous beliefs came from a NAT GEO documentary about the giant squids, but at the time he didn't give it much importance. Just because a thing was proved true it didn't mean that others were true also, but after a month in the country he couldn't deny it any longer: dawn existed, and when it carried the promise of a sunny day, it was a beautiful thing to look at.   
That didn't mean he was going to forgive Chester, his sharecropper's rooster, for starting to crow at the top of his lungs every damn morning at the first beams of light. The stupid beast didn't know it yet, but it was living on borrowed time, and its final appointment with a casserole full of onions and potatoes was just one or two bribes away.  
Mr. Skolnick was very fond of that brutally annoying hen hopper, but Bruce had seen him flinch and be very tempted when the offer had reached 55 dollars. He was ready to go up to 100 bucks, but he felt sure the old farmer would fold around $70.  
Truth be told, he was growing fond of the beast too. His resolve about its final fate was starting to waver a bit in the light of his plan to put a microphone in the pen connected to an amplified stereo system beneath Dick's bed, but that didn't make the daily awakening less traumatic.

Half asleep and mumbling “Coffee... Coffee...Coffee...” like a mantra, Bruce strolled about his bedroom and adjoined bathroom, going through the motion of showering, shaving, and brushing his teeth on autopilot. He looked at his pajama trousers, trying to guess why they were stained and shook his head confusedly when all he came up with was the image of two wolves running. Then he grunted, went back to the bedroom, and stripped off his sheets, also stained as he'd suspected.   
“Wolves notwithstanding,” he grumbled, “it must have been a hell of a dream.”

He put on a pair of CK briefs, a white T-shirt, and his gym trousers, wondering when the last time he'd put on a suit and tie had been, realizing it had really been a life time ago. He couldn't help but smile at the idea that he was just a bit away from starting to wear overalls and broad brimmed straw hats.  
Carrying his bundle of laundry, he trudged sleepily and bare-footed toward the wash machine on the backyard porch, taking care of switching on the coffee machine on his way out. Just thinking about his strongly deserved coffee waiting for him on his way back, changed Bruce's mood for the better to the point that he started humming the tune of Desperate Housewives' theme while he measured the washing powder.

Then a set of headlights appeared on the far end of the unpaved road that cut in halfway through the terrain behind his house, and Bruce wondered who the hell would use it at such a hour. Mr. Skolnick usually arrived around 7:00 and used the front driveway. In the month he'd been living there, Bruce had never seen anybody use that bumpy road. Truth be told, he didn't even know what there was on the other end of that long collection of holes with a Mohican's string of grass in the middle.

“I'm never going to do something as stupid as calling 911 ever again,” he cursed after he recognized the unmistakable logo of a Gotham Sheriff's patrol car. “Another day screwed up, and it's not even morning yet.”

Jim Gordon killed the engine, got out, and stepped up to the porch. He was in uniform: pleated black trousers, tailored khaki shirt, tie, badge and name tag pinned to his chest.   
The second thing Bruce noticed about the sheriff was the serious need of coffee that exuded from the man, and the fact that he looked as tired as he'd looked the previous night. The first was that he looked spiffy with the freshly donned uniform, but Bruce adamantly refused to take it into consideration. It wasn't a manly thought. If he kept on noticing such unmanly things, he could pick up other details, and he really didn't want know on which side the sheriff carried his 'gun' or guess its quite noticeable caliber. No. He didn't want to go there at all.

"Hey, Bruce," Jim said at the bottom of the steps, smiling at the sight of the city prince busy doing the laundry.

"Hey, Sheriff," Bruce answered, stuffing the last of his sheets in the washing machine and closing its drum hastily. "What's up, now?"

Jim nodded sheepishly at Bruce, trying not to fidget too much. "I thought we'd agreed about going with Jim," he said, coming up the steps tentatively.

"OK, Jim. What's up, now?”

Jim refused to listen to, and silently berated, that voice in his mind that said,“Nothing right now, but it's improving.”   
He also tried to keep from blushing and maybe he managed, but he couldn't be sure of it.

“I was going to town when I saw the lights on your back porch and decided to give it a try.” It sounded far fetched even to Jim's ears. It was true he'd seen the lights, but from the street they looked nothing more than tiny points, and surely they didn't mean, by default, that someone was awake in the house. He wasn't going to admit he'd hoped to find Bruce awake, not even to himself.

“A try?” Bruce crossed his arms and smiled at the sheriff, wondering where the nuisance he'd felt at spotting the patrol car just a minute ago had gone. “A try to what?”

This time Jim blushed nicely, mentally calling himself every kind of name. The real reason he'd turned the car into the Kane's back drive was that, after he'd seen the lights on, he'd felt the need to go check and be sure everything was fine with the younger man from the city. Now he didn't have a clue about how to move on the conversation.

“I was going to offer you a ride to town in exchange for some advice,” he ad-libbed, and proudly recognized it was a touch of pure genius. “You've got the car still on the side of the road with a broken semis, and I've got this big press conference at 9:00. I... I've seen how good you are dealing with the press...” he sort of pouted and blushed even more. “Yesterday you said they were going to eat me alive and... and I'm pretty much sure you're right about it.”

Bruce's smile broadened. The sheriff was so cute (Cute? Come on Bruce. Country sheriffs aren't cute, he chastised himself) when he looked so out of his dept.

“You want my advice about how to deal with the press?”

“Yes,” Jim said with another sheepish grin.

“Come on, Jim. You're an ex marine. You're trained to face things tougher than a bunch of Journalists.”

“I keep repeating that to myself since I woke up, but it's of no use. The moment I'm in front of those sharks, I'll start stammering and sweating like a pig.”

Bruce found Jim's sudden bout of shyness very unexpected and endearing. Too many things about the older man were getting more endearing by the minute. Bruce had to admit to himself that it would be easy to fall for someone like the sheriff if the man wasn't carrying the same equipment he did.

“OK, Jim. I see the problem,” he stated, dismissing the line of thought in his mind that was already starting to work around the problem of the gender. “You look in serious need of a ego boost... and of a coffee. Not sure I can help with the first, but the coffee should be ready now.”

“I'd say I could kill for a coffee, but it doesn't sound right giving the circumstances.” Jim nodded, offering what would have to pass for a somber smile, if something like that really existed.

“You're probably right,” Bruce conceded, stepping aside to let the sheriff precede him to the door. He avoided looking at the sheriff's ass, or tried valiantly. He didn't consider himself responsible if, while wandering all around, his gaze had caught a glimpse or two of the object. Certainly, it wasn't his fault if said object was pretty much on display inside those form fitting trousers.

They entered the kitchen, and Bruce went straight to the coffee machine, leaving a petrified Jim next to the door, fighting the conflicting urges to start moving things around until the mess that was Bruce's kitchen regained a semblance of order or to duck and cover before the next rocket hit the place.

“Redecorating?” he asked, still a bit astounded.

“Rebuilding,” Bruce grinned. That reaction was to be expected from someone who used ruler and compass to organize his desk. “The kids and I started with the purpose of getting rid of the wall paper.”  
Jim looked around and nodded. “I can understand why.”

“Yup. Unluckily, we discovered that the paper was the only thing that kept it all together. I guess Wilburn Kane never spent a penny on this house, and it's showing.”   
Bruce filled two mugs of hot coffee, rummaged through the shelf to find the sugar, and joined Jim at the table. He sipped his coffee, savoring it as if it was Ambrosia from the gods.   
Jim couldn't help but notice how the process made Bruce look more alive and even more cute (Cute? For god sake, Jim, get a grip on yourself).

“I can give you the name of a good carpenter.” Jim diverted his attention from the direction his thoughts were going. “Yeah,” he mused silently, “carpenters are a safer topic.”

“Can you give me a stick of dynamite instead? With that I could speed up the fixing of this cesspool.”

“You're aware you're talking with a officer of the law, right?” Jim laughed and tried his first sip of coffee.   
“Wow! This is amazing,” he admitted while he kept on sipping. “It's a caffeine-based, nerve burning bomb, and I'm going to need till next month to shake it off my system, but it's worth it.”

“Glad you like it.”

“Do you think I can afford to buy it?”

“I can't afford to buy it, unless I'm willing to sell a kidney to the black market. Alfred sent here a six month's supply and pretended it was a mistake made in good faith. God bless his big British heart.”

“It's good for you to have Alfred.”

“Everybody should have one. World would be a better place.”

They sipped coffee in companionable silence, both enraptured in the process.

“If I help you fixing your home, can I get a can of this?” Jim offered, pretending to plead.

“Of course, but don't you have a murder to solve first?”

That nipped the playful mood in the bud.  
“Yeah, and that brings us back to the press conference.”

“Don't worry, Jim. I know for sure you won't fail it. Ask me why?”

“Why?”

“Because Flass is expecting you to fail and make a fool of yourself. Do you really want to give him such a satisfaction?”

Jim's posture changed. He straightened up, squared his shoulders, and smiled mischievously. “Not in this lifetime.” He nodded vigorously, and with the tip of his tongue licked away the coffee from his mustache.  
Bruce decided to ignore the stir inside his trousers the unconscious gesture provoked.

“Well... it's been easier than I thought,” he thought, nodding too, then he continued aloud. “You're not a debauched billionaire caught coming out of an exclusive night club in the company of a couple of top models. You're the man in charge. This is your turf, your city, your investigation. They know less than you do, and they need you to provide information. They think you're a redneck country sheriff, but you'll get them all eating from your hand in no time flat.” Bruce paused a moment to increase the emphasis. “You're a tough ex marine, a sheriff who's running a whole county department, and you don't take shit from anybody.”

“Wow!” Jim exclaimed. “You're good at this.”

“Debate team since I was in seventh grade. Give me the right cue and I can out-charm your pants off,” Bruce smiled. “Or so I thought before I discovered I couldn't out-charm a banker enough to grant me a second mortgage on this farm. I guess a great part of my charm has gotten lost with my money.”

Jim pretended to listen and feel sympathetic, but all he really could think about was Bruce convincing him to drop his pants, which provoked some seismic movement in his nether regions. For a moment, before his masculinity reasserted itself, he thought it could be interesting to be charmed in that way, as long as the pants dropping was mutual.   
A snap of fingers brought him back to reality.   
“Have I zoned out again? Sorry.” He anticipated Bruce's possible comment. One corner of his mouth quirked upward in a wry smile that transformed his face and complemented the spark of humor in his eyes. “I should have slept more.”

“Me too, but that frigging rooster out there thought otherwise.”  
They laughed.  
“So, have I earned my ride to town?” Bruce asked.

“That and a full breakfast at 'THE BREAKFAST.' The coffee won't hold a candle to this, but the eggs and bacon are to die for. All the town's big brass gathers there in the morning. Even Julius, the mechanic.”

“The mechanic is big brass?”

“This is Gotham. The first grade teacher and the florist are big brass.”

“OK. Just give me a sec to put on my shoes and wake up the poster boy of reckless adolescence upstairs.”

“OK. I'll wait outside.” Jim nodded and stood up. Just for a moment he gave a cursory look to Bruce bare feet and again he berated himself. There was really something wrong with him that morning if even the sight of a pair of male feet looked sexy.

Bruce watched the sheriff exit, and then he went off to his own room. He picked up a jacket and searched for his shoes beneath the bed.   
He was about the climb the stairs to go wake up Dick, when his attention was attracted by a small light permeating from under the door of his study.   
He looked outside his window and saw Jim waiting for him near his car. He was looking at Chester and smiling, and that reassured Bruce more than thousands of words. It felt nice to know that the sheriff hadn't played him around just to get a chance to snoop around.   
But then, who the hell was using a flash light in his study?  
He walked slowly but with determination toward the door, opened it in one single movement, and switched on the light.  
The intruder stared up at him, looking by all means like a rabbit blinded by the highlights. He froze in place, one hand in the first drawer of Bruce's desk, the other pushing a pen-drive in the USB slot of the still switched off PC.  
Bruce felt his rage boiling up, and he considered the idea of jumping on the intruder and beating him to a pulp, but desisted. For a moment, he felt as if he'd really been played around after all, and the rage increased dramatically.  
When he spoke, his voice was so icily cold and devoid of emotion that the intruder flinched, hearing it.  
“Don't you need a warrant to be here, Deputy Flass?”


	12. Chapter 12

Bruce couldn't help but wonder if Gotham County was sending him a message and if the message was: “Get the hell out this fucking place.”   
He didn't know what he disliked more: the deputy rummaging in his desk drawers, or the gun that the man carried at his side. He knew he could handle the flabby deputy, but he couldn't out run a bullet.

As if on cue, Arnold Flass swung around toward Bruce and drew out his gun, his heart jamming up in his throat. He sucked in a breath, trying to recover his wits, watched the young man for a very long moment, and tried to decide what to do now. Thinking had never been his strongest asset, especially when his world seemed on the verge of collapsing all around him, and this whole situation was sinking faster and faster into a total disaster.   
Just the day before he was sure he was off the hook now that the note which linked him to Jack Napier was safely in his pocket, but it hadn't lasted more than the time necessary for him to go home and find the gift that someone, he didn't know who, had left there.  
The two pictures he found in his mail box were enough to destroy his reputation and his life. Compared to them, Jack's note and the 28 grand were nothing to be afraid of.  
He had tried to think himself out of that new threat, but the only solution seemed to be the one suggested by the note with the picture: to pay.  
The price to get the negatives of those pictures didn't seem too high. He only had to download the content of the pen drive that arrived with the pictures into Wayne's computer, and then lead the BCI to its contents. Framing the city boy hadn't seemed a big price to pay to Flass, but now everything had turned for the worse once again. Here he was, caught red handed, with his gun aimed at the poor sod who carried the guilt of being a newcomer and consequentially an easy escape goat. If there was a way to come out of such a mess, Flass didn't know where to look to find it.  
He watched Wayne lift his arms over his head and wondered if he could intimidate him in to silence. City boys were spin-less. They were easy to boss around.

“I'm an officer of the law. All I need is this,” he said to Bruce waving his gun in his general direction.

Bruce smirked. Not the reaction Flass was expecting. Intimidation didn't seem an available option.

“I'm sure every single law student would disagree with you, deputy. Last time I checked, this was breaking and entering, and it's still a felony.”

“Shut up.”

“Or what? Do you shoot me?” Bruce sounded annoyed and not at all scared. His emotionless reaction confused Flass even more. “How are you going to explain it, deputy? With all those lab jerks running around at the moment and a fresh murder in the county, it won't be easy to get away with something like that.”

“Self defense,” Flass mumbled.

“It's not going to stick. Not with you entering here without a warrant. And by the way, I don't have any weapons here. Do you have a spare piece to put in my hand after you've shot me?”

“A what?”

Bruce refrained himself from showing any sign of emotion. He still felt pangs of fear running through him for the gun, in the hand of an idiot, aimed at him (the worst combination possible), but a part of his mind was already telling him that if he wasn't able to outwit Flass, he deserved to die.

“A spare gun to put in my hand to try to say I aimed it at you.” He could tell Flass was berating himself for not thinking about it.

“So you don't have it. Too bad. And you're also running out of time. Soon my sharecropper will be here. Do you plan to off him too?” He avoided mentioning Dick sleeping upstairs. The less leverage Flass had on him, the more his chances to get out of the situation in one peace increased. He also avoided mentioning the sheriff waiting for him in the backyard. That was the ace on his sleeve; the kingpin of his, still not totally formed, plan.  
“You should have come sooner. These kind of house jobs can't be done in daylight.”

Flass nodded, before realizing he was being mocked.

“I suppose it had something to do with that pen drive sticking out my computer. Don't you know it has to be switched on before anything else can be done?”

“I tried...” Flass retorted. Bruce saw the anger in the man go up a notch and the point of the gun trembling in his hands. Bad sign.

“My bad. I disengage the surge protector when I'm not working.”

“Where is it?”

“Come on. Do you really think you can continue with me around? I don't know what's in that pen drive, but I'm not going to let you do it without saying a word on the matter.”

“I'll kill you.”

“That was pretty much obvious, but we're still back to square one. How do you plan to get away with it unscathed?

Flass was getting purple in the face. Probably the result of too much thinking, Bruce thought.

“You could try to simulate a suicide... After all, I'm very depressed lately. It could stick.”

Flass looked at his gun again, probably trying to think how that piece could work in the new scenario the city boy was suggesting.

“You can't use that piece. Why on earth should I kill myself with your gun?”  
Flass nodded. He seemed unable to do anything else. Bruce wondered how on earth the man managed to become sheriff.

“Let's move to the kitchen.” That was Flass first original thought since the moment he'd been caught. It didn't take much for Bruce to realize the man had concluded the next best choice was a blade.  
He started to move back toward the kitchen an inch at a time without turning his back to Flass. The old coot was capable of shooting him in the back accidentally, shaking as he was.

“A knife, deputy? Two in less than a day?” Bruce said with the same flat tone Alfred would have used to offer another glass of champagne to a guest, conveying without telling that he thought it was a bad idea.

“You don't like the idea, Wayne?” Flass grinned.

“I don't mind. But since I'm not going to help you kill me, you'll have a lot to explain anyway. If you put the knife in my hand, I'm going to give it a try at you, no matter if I get a bullet in the process, and if you're going to stab me yourself, the whole point of the suicide would go amiss.  
In your shoes, I'd try hanging. It's a bit too cliché, but the best ideas are the simplest.”

“Hanging?” The concept seemed to destabilize Flass once again, and the gun started to shake dangerously in his hand.   
Bruce wondered why the sheriff hadn't come in yet to see what was taking him so long to get ready, but he decided that it probably hadn't been that long. It just seemed long. A gun pointed at you can make the time run slowly.

“We should go to the barn...” Bruce stated, still matter of fact. Inside he prayed that the idiot would take the bait. There was an armed sheriff between them and the barn, which was still his best chance.

“Why the barn?” asked Flass.

“Good. Hook, line and sinker,” Bruce thought, then aloud he added. “There's rope there, and timbers.”

“You're trying a trick on me,” Flass protested. It seemed too good to be true.

“Of course I'm trying, deputy. Do you think I'm really that eager to be murdered?”  
They were in the kitchen already. Bruce hoped the sheriff had seen them, but he didn't count on it. His plan was to bring Flass out in the open, possibly without making him aware of the presence of the sheriff. Since Flass didn't seem the kind of man able to do two things at a time, the chances were all in Bruce's favor. All he needed to do was to keep him distracted a bit longer and keep walking.

“Make no mistake. There are shovels in the barn and forks too. If I get a chance to put my hands on them, I'm going to try my best to get you disarmed. Then I'm going to stick that gun so far up your ass, you're going to taste metal on your tongue...” They were to the back door already. Bruce pushed the door open with the heel of his shoes and stepped outside, still keeping his hands up. He kept on talking, wishing that Jim was about to do something.   
“... You still have the gun. If I try to stab you with the fork, you can shoot me and your 'self defense' will stick. The advantage is still yours.”

Flass followed Bruce outside an instant later. Bruce thought they were still a bit too close to each other and that, in his attempt to keep Flass from spotting Jim, he had put himself in both lines of fire. Of course, only if Jim Gordon was keen to shoot one of his men.   
For a moment, the thought that the sheriff could have kept him occupied to give Flass the time necessary to do his job in the study made Bruce doubt his plan, but since he didn't have any other choice, he decided to ban the doubts and trust in the sheriff's integrity.

“Drop the gun, Arnold!”

The voice, stentorian and commanding, came from Bruce's right side and made Flass jump.   
Bruce managed, barely, to keep himself from exhaling in relief. He wasn't out of the wood, yet. If anything, this was the most dangerous moment for everyone involved.

Flass' attention turned to Jim and his mouth hung open at the sight of him. What was he doing there? Why wasn't anything going the right way that morning?  
He felt he was doomed. Everything was lost. What had started out as an attempt to cover his implication in Napier's clandestine gambling house, had turned into a living nightmare able to cost him more than his next election. His life and freedom were at stake now.  
He aimed his gun at Jim, even more shaky than before.

“I won't tell you again, Arnold. Drop. That. Fucking. Gun.”

“Jim... You... You don't understand...” Flass stammered. “It's not what you think...”

Jim watched his deputy a second longer, his gaze somber and steady.   
He saw panic rising in the man, along with anger. Flass was losing it, and he was going to do something stupid. Jim was sure of it. He only felt grateful that Flass wasn't aiming at Bruce anymore. If the older man's stance was something to count on, he had totally forgotten about Bruce, now that his focus and his hatred had a new target.  
He felt sorry for having to kill Arnold Flass. Even if he had never liked the man, killing him would add more burden to carry on his shoulders, and after the Balkans, he could easily do without.

In his desperation, Arnold Flass saw the moment in which his life had started to go downhill. It was when Jim Gordon had won his sheriff's seat. That was when Napier had started to charge him when he lost at poker. That was probably why the pictures of him wearing corsets and crinolines were taken. Nothing of all the mess he was in right now would have happened if that fucking ex marine hadn't come and stolen his perfect life. He deserved to die for it.

“You ruined my life!” Flass screamed and pointed the gun. In that last instant, he looked at Jim Gordon and knew it was already too late. He was going to die.

Then he felt something grip his hand and push it up and on the side. The grip of what seemed like a claw was so strong that the bones in his hands gave away with a loud crack and the pain became excruciating. He dropped the gun and screamed. Then screamed some more, when the same grip forced his arm to turn at a wrong angle, and he had to accompany the movement with the whole torso to keep his shoulder from getting dislodged. A moment later, he was flat on his belly on the wooden porch of the old Kane's farm with his arm twisted behind his back, and his probably broken hand still clutched in the vise of Bruce Wayne's grip.  
A knee was pressed unceremoniously on his lower back, pushing him hard against the wood planks, and the arm not busy shattering his hand was digging his way around his neck.

“I told you I wasn't going to make it easy for you to kill me, Flass.” Bruce told him with ill concealed anger, twisting his arm some more just to enjoy his yelp of pain. He completed the choke hold and kept the wresting maneuverer going till he felt the man going slack beneath him. Then, finally, he drew in a long, slow breath and willed is anger to ebb.

“Bruce...” Jim said to him, reaching out to pick up Flass' gun. “Let it go. I'll take it from here.”  
Bruce nodded and finally moved off the whimpering and blubbering deputy. The old man seemed shocked and totally deflated. He left Jim handcuff him without even trying to protest.

“Are you alright?” Jim asked Bruce.

“No. I'm not,” Bruce admitted, bitterly. “That son of a bitch had kept me at gun point, for god sake. How am I supposed to be alright?”

“I know.”

“No. You don't. I have no idea why he was in my home, why he was trying to stick a pen drive into my computer, or what he'd put into my desk drawers.  
The only thing I know is that in these last minutes all I've seen has been the mouth of his gun.” He stopped to breathe and continued. “ Now, if you excuse me, I'm going to take a little walk to shake away this fucking bout of panic.   
Then I'm going to look around, make sure I'm far enough away, and at that point I'm going to scream my lungs out. After that you can ask me again how I feel, and maybe I will be able to say something more polite than: Fuck this shitty county and all those who keep living here and actually like it.”

“Fair enough,” Jim nodded. “I'm going to call in my men and the BCI, while you look for the right place to scream.”

“They're going to mess around my study, aren't they?” Bruce asked, nonplussed.  
Jim limited himself to a nod that said, 'It can't be helped.'

Bruce stared some more daggers at the almost catatonic Flass, pouted gruffly   
at Jim, and started walking away, ranting about getting back his money, buying the whole town, bulldozing it down to six feet under the actual street level, and building the biggest parking lot in the history of the U.S. over the remains.  
Jim fought to keep a smile from showing up, squeezed his eyes, and for a moment it looked like there were bat shaped wings sprouting from of Bruce's back.   
He shook his head to delete the image, and then turned his attention to Flass.  
The man, still stunned by the choke hold, flinched.

“Jim...” he muttered, supplicant. “I can explain.”

“And you'll do so,” Jim answered flatly, conveying all the disgust he felt. “Not to me. I'm going to hand you to Gerry Stephens and the BCI, and I'm going to be sure they squeeze you till your eyes pop out.”

“Jim, please.”

“Please? Please, you say? You threatened to kill Mr. Wayne. You aimed your gun at me, and don't think I don't know you were going to shoot if you had the chance. For all I know, you're also implicated in the murder of Jack Napier.” Jim said, trying to impart the gravity of the situation and knowing it probably wouldn’t make any difference.   
He heaved a weary sigh and pushed his glasses up on his nose. Just what he needed. If a murder in his county wasn't enough, now the whole integrity of his office was going to be put under scrutiny. BCI was going to turn his whole department upside down, the press was going to have a field day, and he could bet money against cornflakes that mayor Garcia was going to take advantage of it to cut his budget even more. So much for “the clean house” he was so proud of.

“What's going to happen, Jim?” Flass asked, his voice feeble and broken by tears. In other occasions, he would have tried to cut a bargain with Jim, but he knew the game was over.

“You'll have to ask Stephens, Arnold, because I have no idea. This is a serious mess, and you're not going to shake it off easily. Not one of us is.”

Jim left Flass handcuffed and splayed on the floor, and went to his car to make the call to the office.   
In the distance, Bruce's first scream filled the air, followed by a second, a third, and then a series of lower, but also explicit curses.  
Jim would have been more concerned about the whole thing if the recurring theme   
of the screaming hadn't been a litany of 'Fuck you!' followed by a long list of names, including Grant, Kyle, Napier, Flass and some others he didn't recognize.  
Jim knew he had more important things to deal with, but he couldn't help feeling relieved to discover his name was not in that list.


	13. Chapter 13

There were just a few places in Gotham big enough to hold a press conference. One was the school gymnasium, which was excluded as to not upset the school programs for the day and the kids. Another one was the part time church, part time synagogue, part time any other confession center, and it was excluded for the obvious reason that, with so many alternating groups using it, it had a very busy schedule to respect. What remained was the courtroom/city council seat in the courthouse/city hall/sheriff station building. That meant that a lot of journalists were already encamped around the building when sheriff Jim Gordon and BCI agent Gerrard Stephens brought in Arnold Flass.  
Nobody noticed the well concealed handcuffs, but someone amid the crowd managed to hear Gordon tell Montoya to call the doctor.   
The speculations about the beaten deputy were already running wild when the second patrol car arrived and Bruce Wayne entered the sheriff station accompanied by deputy Bullock.   
Agatha Worthington, who was standing guard at the door waiting to start checking press credentials and let people in, saw the commotion spread around the pack of hyenas in main street and prayed, foreseeing a disaster waiting to happen. She tried to catch someone's attention inside the station, but had to desist because she had to start letting people in and screen out the curious, the locals, and those without credentials.

Jim didn't care about the press conference anymore. All he wanted was to get the truth out of Flass as soon as possible and get the whole mess fixed.   
He left the still sobbing and blubbering deputy in the hands of the BCI, found a chair for Bruce to sit in during the reception, and gave him the forms to fill out in order to proceed against Flass.   
He told the younger man, who was still visibly shaken by Flass' aggression, to write down everything that happened that morning and wait for Stephens and him to come back from the press conference. He smiled at Bruce's advice to remember who was in charge, and he headed to the courtroom.

At the front of the room a podium bristling with microphones had been set up directly in front of the judge-mayor’s bench. Another table had been pulled forward to flank it and provided room for three people, their places marked with hand-lettered placards made from folded pieces of cardboard. The names were: Sheriff Gordon, BCI Agent Stephens, Deputy Bullock.   
Only the end chair was taken already. Harvey Bullock sat behind the table, cracking his knuckles and looking like a man with a fear of public speaking waiting to address the U.N.

The noise level rose like a wave rolling onto shore as the reporters caught sight of Jim Gordon and Gerry Stephens coming out from the sheriff's wing of the building. Questions were tossed out in the hope of getting something out of them other than the official statement. They ignored them and that was a mistake. If they had listened with more attention, they could have acted accordingly, but their minds were only on Napier's murder and Flass' involvement.

The town VIPs had been given seats next to the podium and Antony Garcia (the mayor), Harvey Dent(the County Judge), and Barbara Gordon(the county prosecutor), popped up out of their chairs as Jim walked by them. He checked his stride and turned reluctantly to face Gotham's trinity.   
Dent and Garcia were still on the right side of their 40s and too damn good looking; the kind of men people enjoyed voting for. Jim used to call them the GQ twins, even if their look couldn't be more different. Dent was tall, slender, blond and with a patrician profile, while Garcia was shorter, dark haired, perpetually tanned and stocky, but with a face reminiscent of the kind made famous by actors of the 50s. Amid them Barbara, even in her power suit and her perfect to the dot appearance, looked like a dominatrix in full paraphernalia with two slave boys at the leash. The funny thing was he could tell from Dent and Garcia's way of looking at him, that they thought the same about him, and he wasn't sure they were totally wrong about it.

“Jim, can we have a word?” Barbara asked, but it sounded like an order.

“Now?” Jim answered, annoyed. Suddenly feeling like Barbara's door mat didn't appeal to him anymore, and he admitted to himself that Babs was right. He'd given his ex wife too much power over him.

Garcia leaned in close too, eyes fastened hard on Jim's face. “We’re wondering how soon you might have this wrapped up.”

“The press conference? Shouldn’t take more than half an hour.”

“No, no,” the mayor added. “This murder business. We heard what happened to Flass this morning. If Wayne assaulted him...”

“No. you've got it wrong, Antony,” Dent intervened, “It's the other way around. Flass had introduced himself in Wayne's house without a warrant and assaulted him, right?”

“Right.” Jim nodded.

“Are you sure?” asked Barbara.

“I was there when it happened,” Jim confirmed. He spotted something akin to disappointment in the posture of his ex wife, but stashed the information away for later. “I still have no idea why he did it, but the BCI is looking into it right this moment.”

“So he tried to pin the murder on Wayne and he got caught...” The mayor chuckled nervously.

“Congratulation Tony. You solved the case. We can tell the press, send back the BCI and go back to the city's birthday fair.” Jim tried to stretch his threadbare patience a little further, but couldn’t quite manage to cover his sarcasm. “Since both the Judge and the Prosecutor are here, we can skip the trial and go directly to the sentence.”   
He took a pause. “Now, If we're done playing 'Pin the tail on the donkey,' I've got a press conference to do and an investigation to carry on.”

Garcia had the grace to blush. Dent narrowed his eyes and worked his mouth as if he was going to chew the inside of his cheeks till they bled. Barbara put a hand on Dent's arm as if she wanted to keep him from exploding, and she gave Jim a reproachful stare, mostly due to him being rude with the big brass.   
Jim made a mental note to remind his ex wife that the so called big brass put on their trousers a leg at a time like any other man. Something else scratched the surface of his subconscious, something about personal space and closeness between the members of the town's triumvirate, but he was too wired up to give it the right amount of attention.  
He tipped his head and moved away from the trio, stepping around them to reach his place at the main table.

The esteemed members of the press started shouting at him, hands raised like frenzied bidders at the stock exchange.   
Jim's mouth set in a grim line, his eyes fierce beneath the lenses of his spectacles. He nodded to Stephens, who was waiting for him, stepped up to the podium and addressed the crowd.   
He read his statement with eloquence and authority. His scowl was so deep and intimidating that the whole room fell silent.

Stephens moved to the mic after Jim finished. The BCI agent carried a messy sheaf of papers, which he plunked down on the stand, then promptly ignored. He was six feet tall, bulky, and mostly resembled an unmade bed. His tie was crooked and a little spike of hair stuck straight up from the crown of his head. He explained procedures for a few minutes, talked about lab techniques, and what kind of answers they were waiting on. Then he opened the floor to questions.  
Jim would have done without that part. He felt that the whole thing had gone smoothly so far, but there was a tension in the air that he didn't like one bit. Something was about to turn for the worse before it was over.

“Is he in custody?” someone asked.

Jim searched for the source of the voice and found it belonging to a tall, curvy blond with a tag saying 'V. Vale' on the lapel of her jacket. He wondered if she had payed attention at all, since nothing of what he or Stephens had said left room for that kind of question.

“Who?” he asked, and realized immediately the magnitude of the mistake he made.

“Bruce Wayne.” Vale answered. The whole room fell first into an unreal silence, and then exploded all at once, as voice after voice shouted out questions.

“Did Bruce Wayne had a motive?”

“Did he know Napier?”

“Did he assaulted one of your deputies this morning?”

“Has he been charged, already?”

“Did he confess?”

A bout of pure rage rushed through Jim. He steeled himself against it and grabbed the microphone. He wanted to defuse those absurd speculations before they took a life of their own and damaged Bruce, but before he could say something, somebody screamed “There's Wayne!” And pointed in the general direction of the Sheriff's reception where, unaware of everything, Bruce had just finished to write down his report and was valiantly trying to suppress a yawn.

'V. Vale' launched herself out of the courtroom and toward the reception, followed by all the other journalists.   
“Bruce...” she yelled aloud, which forced Bruce to lift his eyes and see the incoming charge coming in his direction.

He swung around in confusion, looking to confront the face behind the voice and recognized Victoria Vale.   
She'd been his and Selina's first fan when they were the 'royal couple' of the city and his first detractor after his financial crack. He'd been harassed by her every single day for as long as the investigation about Grant's fraud lasted. She'd harassed the kids at school. She tried to get the Social Services involved. She tried to imply a murderous scheme of his behind Selina's disappearance. She was, more or less, the reason he left the city. Seeing her here, brought him instantly back in the city and to a lot of bad memories.  
“You know I'm not going to talk with you, Ms. Vale,” he said, as cold as winter storm.   
Then all the hell broke loose.  
A burly, bearded man thrust a tape recorder at him, repeating the questions they'd asked to the sheriff, his voice booming to be heard above the sudden rise of sound. Then another man rose and a flash went off in Bruce's face. He shrank back from it, reaching back with a hand to find some support, only to have fingers close on his elbow. He swung around again and more faces loomed in on him, all of them looking wild, mouths moving, voices pouring out in a stream of babble.

“Did you kill Jack Napier?”

“Why did you kill Jack Napier?

“Did you assault the deputy who came to arrest you?”

“Why did you assault the deputy?”

“Are they going to charge you with murder?”

“What about Grant?”

“What about Kyle's disappearance?”

“Where's the money, Bruce!”

“Bruce!”

“Bruce!”

The sound pounded on his ears as the crowd began to close around him making him feel agoraphobic.   
Bruce felt rage rise in his throat, and he jumped to his feet. He desperately needed to escape before loosing it and give those sharks the show they wanted. He dropped the pen he was holding and dove ahead, trying to cut a path between two photographers, shoving them in opposite directions, slapping at their cameras with his hands.   
Then his eyes focused on one face in the blur: Jim’s. His expression was furious as he shouted at the people around. Bruce grabbed the hand the sheriff held out to him and let Jim pull him away from the crowd.   
They retreated into Jim's office, and Jim slammed the door behind them.

“Stay here,” Jim commanded. “I’ll be right back.”

“Goddamn fucking reporters,” Bruce cursed, fighting the need to go back there and hit someone, but nodded at Jim nonetheless.

Jim went back outside before Bruce could say anything else. Anger burned through him as he scanned the crowd.   
The deputies had restored a certain amount of order.   
Agatha Worthington had tackled down Victoria Vale before she could run away with the report she'd grabbed from Bruce's table, and for good measure, she had slapped her hard a couple of times. No one amid Gotham finest tried to stop her.

The noise level died abruptly as Jim roared a command for quiet. One intrepid fool raised a hand to ask a question, but the arm fell like a wilting weed as Jim turned his full attention on the man.

“Mister Wayne has no statement for the media,” Jim hissed venomously, his voice barely a whisper. Still, it reached every corner of the room, fell on every ear, lifted every neck hair.

“Mister Wayne is not involved in Napier's murder. He has not assaulted one of my deputies. Maybe this is how you're accustomed to working in the city, but this is my county, and I won't tolerate another scene like the one you made right now. Is that understood, ladies and gentlemen of the press?”

Several seconds of silence passed before a reporter spoke up. “What about freedom of the press, Sheriff?”

Jim met the man’s gaze evenly. “The first amendment doesn’t give you the right to harass or slander a witness. Mister Wayne is here just to file a complaint about a breaking and entering. Anything else is pure and simple slandering. Have I made myself perfectly clear?”

He glanced around the room to find most eyes on their steno pads or electronic equipment. Beside him, Bullock was cracking his knuckles and sweating like a horse. Stephens, dark eyes glowing, was rubbing a hand across his mouth to hide a grin of unabashed delight.

“This press conference is over,” Jim murmured, then he turned his attention to Victoria Vale and the woman took a step back in fear, molding herself against Agatha who was still holding her captive.

“Miss Vale, what you're still clutching in your hands is an official document of this department. This qualifies your act as obstruction, tampering of evidence, and endangering an ongoing investigation. Here's your choice. You leave this county right now and never come back, or you stay and get arrested for the above mentioned felonies.”

Victoria Vale tried to protest, but the choke hold Agatha was still exercising around her neck increased just a bit and she desisted.

“Let her go, Agatha.” Jim ordered, and the old woman obeyed, but not before she managed to whisper in Victoria's ear that she'd been in Nam and had learned more than a few tricks from her navy seal friends.

“Do you have something to say, Miss Vale?” Jim continued.

“I protest...” Victoria started.

“Harvey.” Jim called Bullock at his side. “Arrest that woman and make sure she understands her rights...”

“You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you..” Bullock started, moving forward.   
Victoria Vale turned on her heels and marched out of the building, suddenly aware of all her colleagues' eyes on her. She knew she was on the wrong side of the news business, now.

Jim walked to his office, followed by a very welcomed silence.   
Bruce had retreated to a corner. He stood with his back to the wall, rage and disgust marring the lines of his face, hands squeezed so tightly into fists that his knuckles were white and his nails were chafing his palms.

“I’m sorry I screwed up you conference,” he said, his voice hoarse with suppressed emotion.

“You didn't. They did.” Jim shrugged. “Never seen anything like that before.”

“Welcome to my world. Jim Gordon. Now you know why I left the city. It was always like that. Every single moment of every single day since I came back from Germany. I was trying to undo the damage Grant did, and all I got was Victoria Vale accusing me of everything from Abel's death onward. And of course where Victoria Vale is, the whole circus follows.”

“Well. Not here.” Jim reached out his arm and gingerly patted Bruce on the shoulder, trying to show a bit of human kindness and ignoring the warmth rising in him, or the sudden image of two winged bodies intertwined that came to his mind. “She's persona non grata in this county now... And Agatha managed to land a couple of good ones on her face.”

Bruce relaxed a little. The angry scowl attenuated itself, and the hint of a smile surfaced for a moment. “I'm going to send her a 'thank you' gift for that. It's a pity I missed it.”

“Don't worry. With all those cameras around, there's no way you'll miss it. I guess it's on its way to Youtube already.”

“Vale's going to paint you like the stupidest sheriff of the stupidest county on earth. You know it?”

“I don't care.” Jim was adamant about it. Miss Vale was the least of his concerns for the time being.   
“Are you okay now?” he asked Bruce, letting go of Miss Vale and her theatrics.

“Yeah.” Bruce nodded solemnly. “I’m OK. I should be used to this kind of treatment by now, I suppose.”

“No one should have to get used to that,” Jim admitted, a discrete smile flipping up one corner of his mouth. “Not here in my county, anyway.”

“If you say so. That 'WELCOME TO GOTHAM' signpost at the town's entry misses a 'YOU ARE NOT' on the top.” Bruce smiled.

“No. It doesn't. And I'm going to prove it.” Jim grinned back

“How?”

“Feel like having lunch with me at THE BREAKFAST?”

“Today? With the press still out there and the town-folks piling up wood chops to burn the witch?”

“That's the point of the exercise, Bruce. Dealing with these people is like herding sheep. When you want to introduce someone new in the flock, you have to rub it against some others till it picks up a familiar smell.”

Both men looked at each other, aware that there was a double entendre in that phrase and determinate to ignore it.

Jim continued. “You need to be chaperoned into this community, Bruce. Things will go a lot better when you start to blend in.”

“And you're offering to chaperon me in?”

“Yes, I am.”

“Why?”

Jim laughed. “Because, Bruce Wayne, you're a trouble magnet, and I'm a manic compulsive trouble mender. We were meant to find each other...”


	14. Chapter 14

Lunch at THE BREAKFAST was an institution second only to the breakfast in the place. It missed the massive presence of the farmers, but was usually full to the brim with the town's desk jockeys.  
The town trinity was there as usual, sipping coffee and talking about Napier's murder and the press conference. Mayor Garcia was laughing and saying that sheriff Gordon carried a pair of cojones so big they needed a ZIP code of their own. Barbara was laughing and nodding, mumbling something about not being able to deny it. Judge Dent was flipping a coin and grimacing at those statements, but nobody could tell if he was amused or pissed. It was always like that with Dent, especially when the conversation involved someone who was not him.   
In another bench, banker Oswald Cobblepot was eating alone, reading distractedly an article about the murder and ogling the town councilor and lead topiarist, Pamela Isley. Reverend Dowley and Rabbi Holden were sharing a bench, chatting companionably while savoring cheese cake.

Helena Bertinelli, Harlene Quinzell, and Pamela Isley were sharing a table and talking in low voices. They all had salads in front of them, but none of them seemed interested in eating. Harlene seemed distraught and the other two 'former Prom queens' seemed to try in vain to comfort her and made her a little less conspicuous. Everybody but Jack's wife knew she'd been Napier's mistress and that wasn't something to parade around so blatantly the day after his murder.

Behind the counter, Deputy Harvey Bullock was piling up plates in the washer and cooing shamelessly with Maria Montoya, 'The Breakfast's owner and also Renee's cousin. The only scandalous thing about that was that they shouldn't have been still so lovey-dovey after 9 years of marriage, 2 rambunctious children, and a third in the making.   
Being the conscientious officer of the law he was, Harvey didn't miss noticing the little display of emotions at the 'prom queens' table, or the position of Harvey Dent's hand on Barbara Gordon's arm. He stashed both pieces of information under the label 'Things Jim should know' and went on fussing around his pregnant wife, who playfully menaced him about dying her hair blond if he didn't stop being so apprehensive.

All around, members of the press were coming and going with 'take away' bags, but after the rubdown they'd gotten from the sheriff in the morning, they'd stopped moving around the town as if they owned it.

Jim timed his arrive to the Breakfast so as to make his appointment with Bruce look casual, but he made it a point to show, to everyone interested, the friendliness they were showing toward each other. He was determined to find a way to silence the speculations about Bruce Wayne being involved in the Napier's murder, even if it meant parading with him in front of the whole town and all the cameras still present. He knew he was probably overdoing it a bit, but couldn't help it. Bruce didn't deserve the shit everybody was throwing at him and that was that.   
Stubborn as he was, Jim adamantly ignored considering any further reasons for the interest he was displaying for someone he'd met just the day before.

“Towed in the car?” Jim asked Bruce, aloud enough for the journalist near them to pick up the easygoing tone of his voice.

“Yeah.” Bruce nodded, smiling at the sheriff and then launching an incinerating glance at the noisy journalist who, cautiously, quickened his step and kept walking.

“Bought the new cell?”

“Nope. Forgot the old one at home. Any progress with your case?”

“Some, but it's still too soon?”

“BCI finished with my computer?”

“You'll have to ask Stephens. With the mess Flass did, my office has been pushed back and out. BCI guys went this close to telling us all to go back to looking for missing cats and dogs.”

Bruce smirked. “Are we done with the show for the press?”

“Am I that transparent?” Jim smirked back. Bruce, politely, refused to answer, but the gleam in his eyes betrayed him, making Jim laugh aloud.

“Ready to go in?”

“Yeah. It can't be worse than the Grand Jury I faced after Grant went AWOL”

“That's the spirit.”

When they entered, Bruce braced himself for the worst nonetheless, expecting the whole locale to fall into an unnatural silence or to have all the eyes on him, but nothing of the sort happened. Jim looked at him and quirked up the corners of his mustache, as if to say “told you so”.

Julius Brakeman, the mechanic, stopped for a moment to look at the lovely figure of Miss Bertinelli, to pat Bruce on the back, and give him a key. He told him he was going to look at the car immediately.   
When he saw the key, Jim guffawed, enticing Bruce's curiosity.

“He's given you the 'Tumbler,'” Jim announced, as if it explained everything.

“Yeah. He called it that. So what...”

“The Tumbler is Julius' pride and joy. It's a monster of a Jeep that he's built up from scratch. It can climb walls, tow tractors, and wade rivers, but it totally lacks suspensions and dampers. It's like riding a rodeo's bull, but Jules loves it more than his mother... Which isn't saying much since his mother left when he was five year old, but you've got the idea. He must like you a lot to give it to you.”

“Not everybody hates me on sight, Sheriff,” Bruce smiled, “but I guess that promising to let him look under the hood of a Lamborghini must have helped.”

“You don't have a Lamborghini right now.”

“Yeah. But I told him that Alfred does. Knowing someone who knows someone who drives a Lamborghini seemed more than enough for him.”

“Well. If it helps to speed Julius up, I'll see to rent one the next time we'll get one of our patrol cars checked up.”

"Steak and salad, sheriff?" called Maria from the far end of the counter. Bullock looked behind his back and blushed a little. He gave his wife a last kiss, patted her belly, and nodded to the sheriff as he put the apron aside and walked out. Maria shook her head at the retreating form of her almost running husband. Everybody, starting from Jim, knew he used to spend his lunch break helping her in the local. Why he felt like bolting away every time a Uniform walked in, was far beyond her comprehension of Harvey's quirks.

“That will do, Maria,” Jim said as he sat at his usual table, signaling Bruce to sit in front of him. He didn't miss the odd stare he received from his ex wife and Dent because of his offer, and that seemed to convince him he was doing right. “ What about you, Bruce?”

“The same...”

Maria put two big steaks on the grill, picked up the coffee pot, and poured them both a cup. “Are we still OK for the BBQ, Jim?” she asked, the part stating 'with this murder mess going' elegantly omitted, but still present.

“I hope so. Babs and Jimmy look forward to the first BBQ of the season. I'd hate to be the one calling it off.”

“Same goes for crasher and smasher.”

Jim laughed. Bruce arched his eyebrows inquisitively, and Maria smiled at him.

“My twins,” she explained. “Actually they're Kevin and Jason, but Harvey calls them Crasher and Smasher because they like to destroy things. When they grow up, they're going to set up a Demolition Company.”

“There's money in demolition,” Bruce commented, smiling. “Lot of old things to take down to make room for new ones.”

“That's what Harvey keeps saying.” Maria smiled back.

“Maria's Bullock's wife,” Jim introduced.

“From the way deputy Grumpy looked at her, I suspected it.” Bruce nodded. “No offense, madame...”

“None taken. Harvey's a teddy bear, but he doesn't want people to know it.”

“Do you know Bruce Wayne, Maria?”

“I've seen him around,” she answered, and then to Bruce, “Nice to meet you.”

“My pleasure.”

“Why don't you come to the BBQ too? I'm sure your kids will like it.”

Jim's smile lit room. He looked at Bruce and without saying a word told him two things at the same time: “See. It's easier than you think,” and “say no, and I'm going to kick your ass.”

“I wouldn't want to impos... Ouch!” Bruce looked grimly at Jim, who'd just kicked his ankle under the table and was pretending he didn't.

“Come on. It'll be fun,” Maria insisted.

“Well, OK then. Should I bring something?”

Maria laughed as if he'd just said the funniest thing in the world and went back to check on the steaks. Bruce had to look at Jim for explanations.

“We started the BBQ tradition years ago with the 'everybody brings something' rule, and all of us wound up eating left overs for weeks afterward. So we changed the rules. Now everybody invited to a BBQ reciprocates inviting all the others to his or her BBQ. Usually the Bullocks open the season. Mine is on July 4. Agatha closes the season in October, and there are another six or seven from here to there.”

“Another big brass routine?”

“No. It's just something between us guys from the office... You see that red headed Amazon there with the mayor and the judge?”

“The sexy Dom who's drilling holes in my forehead with her eyes every time she thinks I'm not looking?”

“That's her. She's my ex wife, and she's Big Brass here around. She finds our BBQs boring most of the time, and beneath her station for the rest of them. The mayor is the only one included in our BBQ tour, but he's like me: Big Brass by election only.”

“So now I'm part of the BBQ tour. Right?”

“Is that a problem?”

“Not at all. But I'll have to take notes to learn how to be a good host. Alfred was the one in charge of those things in the city...”

“You'll do just fine, boy. You're a fast learner.”

“So they used to say...” Bruce smiled then, peeved by Barbara's continuous staring at him, he lifted his hand and saluted her. Surprisingly, she smiled back and nodded pleasantly. The one who tried to kill him with a glance was the blond guy sitting next to her. He almost bolted from the seat and pushed and pulled till Barbara and Garcia where up and ready to go too.

“So you think my ex wife is a sexy Dom?” Jim asked watching Barbara leaving. Bruce caught something in Jim's voice and debated mentally if it was a case to investigate deeper, but then Gerry Stephens joined them, and the moment passed.   
Stephens sprawled himself in the chair next to Bruce without even asking and signaled to Maria to bring him the same as they were having.  
Jim didn't seem to mind at all, and Bruce wasn't caring enough to protest. On the other side of the local, the trinity looked at the newly formed trio with ill concealed curiosity.

“You've make the noon's news, Jimbo,” Gerry said as a opening. Amusement was in his voice, and Jim shot him an annoyed look that Stephens ignored. “Your clash with Vale stole the thunder to all the rest, but that's not bad. And she came out like the bitch she is.”

Stephens grinned. He was the picture of rumpled relaxation: his tan chinos creased from too many wearings without washings in between, and his plaid sport shirt looking as though it had been snatched out of the laundry basket without benefit of seeing an iron.

“I think she's getting a taste of her own medicine right now. Must be Karma. Don't you think so, Mr Wayne?” he drawled, involving Bruce in the conversation.

“Couldn't care less,”. “ Bruce answered, trying hard to be polite and diplomatic. He failed. “She had it coming. Hope she'll wind up writing obituaries.”   
He decided to change argument. “Have you finished with my Computer?”

“Not yet. My boys are still dusting the prints on it. Flass touched everything but the right button. We're pretty much sure he didn't manage to download the contents of the pen drive onto it, but we're bound to check.”

“Well. That's my work station, so you won't find much. If you're looking for MP3s, you should try my kids'.” There was more than a trace of sarcasm in   
Bruce's tone, but that left Stephens totally unruffled.

“What's on the pen drive?” Asked Jim.

“Encrypted files.” Even talking about evidence in front of a civilian and a potential suspect didn't seem to bother Stephens much. “We're trying to decode it right now. The same code was used in some of the files we've found in Napier's laptop. Not sure they are the same yet, but it looks to me that Flass wanted us to think they were.”

“Why?” Bruce couldn't help but asking.

“If Napier's encrypted files were found in your computer, you'd be back being suspect number one in this case. As the press conference proved to us all, with you in the spot light, nobody else would get more than a passing blink.” He rubbed his hands together satisfactorily while Maria put big steaks and salads in front of them all, then he started to deal with his meal, the rest of the sentence he wanted to say, totally forgotten.

Bruce started slashing his steak too, but he hadn't forgotten. He looked seriously at Jim. “There is someone in your little county who doesn't want too many stones turned.”

“They should have thought about that before offing Jack,” Jim answered, grimly.

“You don't think it's Flass?” Stephens asked between morsels.

Both Bruce and Jim shook their head at the same time, a thing that Stephens didn't miss but pretended too. It was Bruce who voiced both thinkings in the matter.  
“You've seen him in action, Agent Stephens. That man can't walk and scratch his butt at the same time.”

“Slashing someone's throat doesn't require walking, Mr Wayne.”

“Point taken, but call me Bruce.”

“He told me he's been blackmailed into entering into Bruce's house, Gerry.” Jim started.

“It's more than he told us. He totally clammed up the moment we showed him the pictures.”

“What pictures?” Bruce had to ask.

“We found them in his car. Pictures of him dressed in a drag.” Stephens had to call in all his training to keep from laughing over the whole thing.

“He tried to kill me and Jim to keep from being discovered as a cross dresser?”  
Bruce couldn't conceal his mounting anger for such an idiocy.

“As if it was such a big secret,” Jim added, a little pissed off too. “It's one of the most open secrets of the county.”

“So, that poor bastard did all this for nothing,” Stephens commented.

Jim nodded. Bruce stuffed his mouth with meat to keep from saying more, but his resolve lasted just till he finished chewing.  
“The way I see this, whoever is behind this homicide had chosen to use Flass to frame me. If everything went as planned, I'd be up to the neck, and we'd having this conversation at the station with me in handcuffs, probably. If something went wrong, Flass was the one taking the fall. It's win-win situation for the real culprit.”

“You should hire him, Jim. He'd make a good detective.” Stephens grinned. “Sadly we have to go where the evidences lead us and that's Flass.”

“As it was supposed to be me.” Bruce had to point out again. He knew he had to work on his increasing bouts of paranoia, but that didn't mean that there wasn't someone trying to frame him.

“I know it's frustrating, Bruce.” Jim tried to placate him.

“This will keep the BCI stuck with Flass for a while. Not to mention that right now they can't use your office, Jim, since it may be compromised. Whoever is behind this has all us in his web.  
Guess he, or she, is trying to gain time to cover the tracks leading to him, and he's succeeding.”   
Bruce took a pause. He let his mind work around, while he and his table companions gave another go at their meals.  
“What about Napier's trousers?” he asked after a while.

“What about that?” Asked Stephens.

“Why did Flass move Napier's dick around? It was uncalled for... Maybe there was something in the pockets... Some others pictures, maybe...”

“Told you. You have to hire this guy, Jim. He's good.”

“I'm seriously thinking about it, Gerry.” Then to Bruce, “Do you want a job, Bruce?”

“I'll think about it,” Bruce answered, then to Stephens. “Now. Did you ask Flass why he played with Napier's dick?”

“Yes. But as I said, he'd clammed up. He's asked for a lawyer and that's the end of it, until the lawyer arrives.”

Bruce nodded and thought about it for a moment. “When the lawyer arrives, tell Flass you can convince me to withdraw the charges against him if he speaks and gives you total cooperation. That should loosen his tongue.”

“It's bigger than that. Even without you, the case is still solid.”

“Yup. But without me, it's like facing community service instead of jail time... he'll take the bait, believe me...”

Stephens laughed aloud. “Do you want my job, Bruce?”

“Or mine?” echoed Jim.

“Nope. But I want the ass of the son of a bitch who tried to frame me...”

Jim's cell phone went off, stopping Bruce from continuing. He didn't want to listen, but the distressed girl's voice coming out of the speaker gained his full attention.

"Dad! Dad! It's Jimmy. And Tim, Dad. They're hurt... bad!"

"Babs!” Jim's voice trailed of, and he went pale all of a sudden. “Where are you? What happened?"

"We're in the basket ball court behind the school. And it was Jason Todd. He and his friends ganged up on Jimmy and Tim and beat them.”

“I'm on my way, Babs. I'll be there in a couple of minutes."

“Dad. Do you know how to find Mr. Wayne?”

“Yeah. He's here. I'll bring him along.”

“Good... I'm trying to keep Dick Grayson from going to kill Jason Todd, but I don't know for how long I can manage.”

"It's okay Babs, just stay with the kids. We're coming...”

Bruce was already up and sprinting toward the door. Stephens nodded to Jim, acknowledging the situation, and searched for his wallet to pay. Jim bolted after Bruce and found him already in the tumbler, gunning the engine. He jumped in as the jeep was starting to move, and all he said was “Go... Go... Go...”


	15. Chapter 15

Jimmy and Tim had been talking together about the Batman's legend and minding their own business when Jason Todd showed up with some of his buddies, all of them older and bigger than the two kids. The first bell announcing that lunch time was almost over had passed already, and most of the people were back inside. A professor was supposed to stay out with them and survey the proceeding, but that was a rule pretty much constantly ignored.

"Well, if it ain't the blond fairy and his new boyfriend," Jason spouted off sarcastically, enticing a round of cackling from his crew.

"What do you want, Todd?” Jimmy retorted, trying not to look scared.   
Jason Todd had been Jimmy's constant nemesis since fourth grade, and sadly he'd collected acolytes since then, including a couple of boys with whom Jimmy had grown up with since kindergarten.   
Next to him Tim couldn't help but wonder what kind of dumb ass could be so stupid as to attack the sheriff and county prosecutor's son, and he sadly realized that Jason Todd and his goons fit the bill to perfection. He wondered if he could take down Todd, who was at least 4 inches taller and 15 pounds heavier, and decided he would have a chance at it if the bully was alone and not with five lackeys with him.

“I've got a message for your mom,” Jason cackled, pointing his index finger at Jimmy's chest, “Tell her that sucking the judge's cock to win cases is not fair...”   
Jason's stepdad was spending days in prison for DUI. Totally drunk, he'd totaled three cars parked in main square, one of them the county hearse.

“It's not her fault if your father's so dumb he can't miss a parked hearse.” Jimmy knew that little statement wouldn't help him, but he was his father's son after all. Sometimes he was too stubborn to know when running was better than fighting.   
Tim wasn't that stubborn. He thought about running and asking for help, but he didn't want to leave Jimmy alone; didn't think he could make it to the hall with so many thugs between him and the school entrance; and above everything else, he knew it was already too late for that.

“I'll show you who's dumb,” Jason yelled and landed a solid punch to Jimmy's gut.  
Jimmy bent over. He didn't have to think about straightening up because someone had his arms pulled behind him and held him there, almost bent backwards, while Jason hit him time after time.   
The guy holding Jimmy let go, and the boy fell to the ground, gasping for air.  
Two of Jason's friends grabbed Tim and another landed fist after fist in his belly. Tim managed to kick one of his assailants in the knee, and he elbowed one of the two restraining him. That allowed him to get free of the hold and charge Jason, but the bully hit him squarely in the face, knocking him down.

The group surrounded Jimmy and Tim, and they started kicking randomly. Jimmy caught one in the side and one in the back. The pain made him black out for a moment.   
Tim protected his face with his forearms, but the force of the kick he parried was enough to make his arms collide with his nose, smashing it and making it bleed. Almost blinded by the swell of his eyes, Tim kicked back out of pure reflex and got Bob Dodge, Jason's lieutenant, squarely in the nuts.

Then all the hell broke loose.

Dick outran the professors in front of him and landed on Jason and his crew like a bird of prey. Three of them were already down and howling in pain when Professor Landing and the janitor arrived. Two others were running away and Jason was uselessly fighting to get free of a choke hold and getting abnormally blue in the face.  
Dick refused to let Jason go, even when the professor started to pry his arm away from the other kid's neck. Rage had Dick so transfixed that he didn't seem to realize he was effectively strangling the other boy.

“Dick, please, let him go,. Tim needs your help.”

Initially Dick saw just a blur of red, not different from the red spots he'd been seeing since the moment he realized someone was hurting Tim. Then the red blur shaped into a mass of red hair, and finally the voice of Barbie Gordon permeated his mind. He boggled and let go of Jason as if he was scalding.   
The thug fell on his knees and started to breathe heavily. Dick ignored him and went to kneel next to Tim. He looked at Barbie, who was already doing the same with her brother and speaking in the cell phone at the same time. Silently he mouthed a thank you to her and she nodded back, just once.

Jimmy kept rolling around, tears running silently down his cheek. His whole body was one big mass of pain. He hurt so bad that he just barely let some things kind of register with him, such as the presence of his sister and his dad's voice coming from her cell phone. Knowing his dad was coming didn't lessen the pain he was getting from his back and side, but at least it reassured him that the worst was over. Slowly, he turned his head to the side and looked at Tim.  
Tim's face was starting to bruise all over. His lower lip was bleeding as was his nose, which was also a little bent to the right. He was awake, but looked a bit stunned. He was trying to lift his hand to to reach out for Dick, but kept failing.

“I'm sorry...” Jimmy mumbled with clenched teeth, fighting back a bout of nausea.

“Not... youv... “ Tim stammered.

“Not your fault...” Dick finished Tim's phrase. “It's his...” and he pointed at Jason, still on his knees and surrounded by almost all the teachers. For a moment Dick blanked out again and made for throwing himself against Jason, but once again it was Barbara who kept him from doing it; she just ordered him not to. Her simple “Don't!” placated Dick once again and gained her a shadowy attempt of a smile from Tim.

Dick just held his ground menacingly till he saw Bruce running toward them, followed by the sheriff. Then, and just then, he let go and deflated totally, as if all his energy had been drained away.

"Easy, kid, I'm here." Bruce tried to not sound like he was too worried, but he failed.

“They hurt him, Da... Bruce.” was all Dick stammered back at him, still unfocused and trembling with rage. Bruce registered Dick's slip of the tongue, but let it pass. There were more important matters to deal with.

“I know... I know... Take a deep breath and exhale. Again... again... Keep doing that till I tell you to stop... It's OK, Dick... Just relax.”   
Bruce nodded at Dick, smiled and kept holding Dick's hand reassuringly while he knelt next to Tim.

"Where does it hurt, champs?" He asked, foreseeing the answer already. He reached out and caressed Tim's hair soothingly.

Tim looked at Bruce through puffed, black and blue eyelids and tried to muster enough bravery to downplay his pain, but when he opened his mouth, the pain coming from his swollen and bleeding lip was enough to make him give up the try. "Evevywheve... Bvuce... It.. It huvts all ovev," he stammered. “How's Jimmy?”  
As if on cue, next to him, Jimmy screamed “ Don't! . .Don't touch me!" and then  
whimpered. "It hurts, it hurts too much, Dad!"

"Easy, Jimmy. Easy. Just lie there. I won't touch you anymore. I Promise," Jim whispered, removing his hand from his son's side and closing it in a fist that he tried to conceal. His eyes were moist. Seeing his son like that was hurting him so bad he felt the physical need to hit something, but he kept it under control.   
Jason Todd, still on his knees not far away from them all, smirked. That was all it took. Dick tried to reach for him, but was kept back by the strong grip Bruce exercised on his wrist. Barbara sprinted up from her knelt position as if she was exiting from starter blocks and in few steps was in front of Jason. She hit him hard and fast with the back of her forearm and hand, sending him flat on the concrete floor.   
“Don't you dare, you stupid dumb fuck...”She screamed, and then she realized she'd probably qualified for her very first suspension from school. She turned slowly and meekly toward her father, who was looking at her as if unable to believe what had just happened, bent her head repentantly, and mouthed a silent “Sorry, Dad.”

“For goodness sake, can you move them away?” Jim ordered to the teacher next to Todd, and then he turned his head toward Principal Snyder and gave him such a hard stare that the little man flinched and looked elsewhere.   
“Have you called the ambulance?” He asked and all the present, from the principal to the school nurse, nodded at the same time and with the same meek reverence. Jim Gordon in his full 'Drill sergeant' mood was still an intimidating son of a bitch, and everybody in Gotham county knew it.

“Damn, Eugene. Tell me how something like this can happen in the middle of school time...” Jim insisted, pinning the principal to his responsibilities.

“Jim, I lost track of them just for a minute, I swear...” Said Mr. Landing in answer. He sounded like he could die of shame at any moment.

“A minute too much...” echoed Bruce, still dividing his attention between Tim, who was slowly regaining his focus and grimacing in pain more and more, and Dick, whose rage seemed restrained just by Bruce's continuous reassuring touch.

“We're sorry Mr. Wayne,” the principal muttered.

“I suppose you're going to suspend all the people involved in this fight...” Bruce continued, frowning menacingly.

Principal Snyder felt cornered. “ School's regulations...” he mumbled, “Of course Timothy and James have no responsibilities in this. But Jason and the others will have to be suspended... And...” he stuttered, “ Richard and Barbara too. We can't let people exact justice on their own in our perimeter.”

“I'm not going to fight that,” Jim told the principal and, next to him, Barbara blushed visibly. Dick looked at her and smiled for a fraction of a second. Barbara smiled back at him, still trying to look repentant at the same time.  
Jim pretended not to notice it. “You're going to hear from Barbara's mother about the lack of surveillance in this place,” he kept on saying to the principal, who seemed very close to disgracing himself at the thought.

“And you, young men,” Jim said turning his attention to Jason and Bob, who had the grace to flinch at his stare. “You have no idea how deep in trouble you all are.”

Soon, the only ambulance in service at the County Hospital parked next to the Tumbler and a couple of paramedics arrived, carrying the stretcher with them. They made everybody step aside and started to prod both Tim and Jimmy, declaring it was better to bring them both to the E.R. Tim's nose and arm seemed in need of a fix and Jimmy could have had a broken rib, if not something worse like internal bleeding.   
Then Harvey and Renee arrived. Jim left them in charge of everything and told Renee to call Helena Bertinelli from Social Services for Todd and his crew. He didn't give any more instructions to his deputies, but just naming Bertinelli and the Social Services was enough to let everybody know that there were going to be a lot of consequences for the six assailants.  
Principal Snyder offered to postpone Dick and Barbara's suspension of a day, to allow Jim and Bruce to follow Tim and Jimmy to the hospital without having to deal with the red tape to get the other two out of the school perimeter.  
Jim gave Snyder a curt nod of acknowledgment. Bruce ignored the principal and asked Dick, in a very quiet voice, if he could trust leaving him all to himself for the rest of the school day.   
Dick looked at Bruce, saw how pale, shaken, and guilt ridden he looked and that was all he needed to sober up from his rage high and nod.  
“Let me know how it's going at the ER, OK?” he told Bruce, and then he knelt again next to Tim.   
“I'll see you later, lil bro,” he whispered. Tim nodded imperceptibly, and even if clogged by the blood in his mouth and nose, he said: “OK, Big Bvo. See ya latev.”

-*-

Jimmy was lifted up on the stretcher and loaded into the ambulance. Tim managed to get in on his own feet, but that was all the paramedics permitted him to do. They attached blood pressure cuffs on both kids and kept working with stethoscopes, asking all kind of questions in order to look for concussions.

With both kids and the paramedics stuffing the ambulance to the brim, Bruce and Jim had to follow with the Tumbler. They didn't speak to each other. Bruce kept on mumbling about the damned place and how he needed to take the kids away from it. Jim pretended to ignore the rambling and busied himself with trying to reach Barbara. Both her cell and home phone kept on ringing uselessly for all the time it took to reach the small county hospital. In the end, Jim was cursing everything as much if not even more than Bruce did.

At the hospital the kids were moved onto beds. A nurse came in and started asking all sorts of questions, most of them about insurance. Both Jim and Bruce started dealing with paperworks until Principal Snyder's secretary arrived and took over, filling all the forms with the school's insurance's codes.

Then the path of Waynes and Gordons parted as the kids were lead to two different consulting rooms.

A doctor came in Tim's room and introduced himself to Bruce as Doctor Nowlan.  
He started asking questions to Tim and checked his bruises and cuts. He also checked the nose's bridge and declared it not broken, just a little bent to the side. He told Tim that didn't mean it wouldn't hurt to straighten it again, but at least they didn't have to do a whole nose job. He also said he was more concerned about the right arm, so he called in a nurse to clean up the blood off the kid and ordered X-rays for him

In the next room, doctor Burton and a couple of nurses were taking care of Jimmy.

"Jim, I hope you know who did this to your boy, here," He said to the sheriff. "I can count at least three different foot prints on his body, but what bothers me more is where they are... We'll do some x-rays to see if there's any internal damage. It shouldn't be long before we have a complete picture."

Jim nodded and went through the motion, while the orderlies undressed and cleaned up Jimmy. Just out of habit he kept dialing Barbara's number, but he kept having no answer.

Jimmy got bathed by the orderlies and taken to the x-rays. Then he was made to   
pee in a cup to see if there was blood in the urine. Doctor Burton wrapped a huge bandage around Jimmy's chest and finally decided he could have something for the pain. By then his sister had arrived and was standing next to his father. Both watched him slipping in and out of sleep form the effect of the meds, while Jim kept trying to get his mother on the phone.

When Barbara finally came to the hospital, Jim was almost livid with anger, and it took a lot of self control for him not to snap at her there and then. She didn't try to justify herself in any way. She just acknowledged she hadn't notice the cell was switched off and proceeded to interrogate doctor Burton about Jimmy's conditions. Doctor Burton reported the broken and cracked ribs and a little trace of blood in the urine that meant probably a minor kidney bruise. He told the Gordons he was going to keep checking on him for a couple of hours more, and then if nothing else came up, he was going to discharge him.  
Still half asleep Jimmy asked about Tim, and doctor Burton told him they were fixing his arm and nose. He added that the other kid had asked about him too and sent him a message about sending the bat-man after Jason Todd.  
Jimmy, Jim, and Babs laughed, but Jimmy had to restrain himself. Laughing was making his ribs hurt too much.

-*-  
In the only other wing of the small Hospital, Tim had had his nose straightened up, fixed with two big tampons and bandaged. He couldn't believe that it was possible to stick such a huge amount of gauze up someone's nose, but that was just a mild hindrance compared to the pain he felt when his nasal cartilage had been put back in the right position. The only thing worse than the pain had been to look at Bruce going white in the face and cringing in sympathy.  
Dick, who'd had arrived in the meanwhile, hadn't managed to stay through the whole process and had run out the room first and then the hospital. From then on, he'd kept coming and going, every time becoming frantic after just few minutes. Tim couldn't help thinking that Dick was making too much of show, considering he wasn't the one actually in pain.  
Then the orthopedic had come with the results of the x-rays, and he told Bruce that both radius and ulna were fractured, but it was a clean fracture, so there was no need for surgery or screws. Forty days of plaster would be enough to mend it.   
They waited some more, and Tim got checked over and over for signs of concussion. Luckily it looked like there was not any indication of it, but the doctor recommended for Bruce to keep an eye on him for the next 24 hours and gave him a pretty long list of symptoms to look for.  
Finally someone else came and put Tim's right arm in a plaster cast, telling him that he'd have to keep it for 45 days, have it x-rayed again after 20, and get physiotherapy once the cast was off.   
Due to the still present risk of a concussion, all Tim got for the pain was aspirin, and in his humble opinion, that was like shooting at an elephant with a slingshot.  
While waiting for the discharge forms, Tim wobbled uncertainly to the closest bathroom and managed to take care of his plumbings using his left hand. He rejoiced at the thought that he didn't have to go through the embarrassment of asking for help for such an easy task as peeing, and confirmed it loudly to both Bruce and Dick, who were waiting to be called from outside the door.  
Washing his only available hand required a bit more attention, but he managed. Before leaving, he gave himself a once over in the mirror and almost didn't recognize the kid looking back at him. The poor thing looked like he'd been run over by a truck with that big bandage on the nose, black and blue contusions all around the eyes, the cheekbone, chin, and on the lower lip, just around the cut.   
His analytic mind couldn't help but notice that all that damage was surely too much for something that had lasted for such a short amount of time from start to end. He hoped that Jimmy had had better luck than him, but he doubted it.  
He didn't realize he'd spent too much time in the bathroom, lost in his own thoughts,till he saw the door, the one he knew he'd closed to keep Bruce and Dick from following him, getting opened from outside.  
He turned and said something like “I'm OK... I'm coming out...” to whoever was coming in.   
“I'm glad to hear that, Master Timothy,” Said a voice, and then a wiry, sinewy silhouette filled the door space.   
“Alfved!” Tim screamed happily and his broad smile split open the cut on his lip again. He didn't care. He took a couple of steps and launched himself on the old man, hugging him with only an arm but with all the strength he possessed.  
Alfred knelt and reciprocated the hug, paying a lot of attention to avoid hitting some hurting spot. Behind the old butler, Bruce and Dick watched the scene without saying a word. Bruce also managed to smile at the scene in front of him and felt a tiny bit better for the first time in hours.


	16. Chapter 16

Jim couldn’t remember feeling this exhausted. His eyelids fell like blackout curtains, and he dropped his head back and groaned. He rubbed his hands over his face, slicked his hair back, turned his head to watch in the back seats where Jimmy was dozing and leaning against his sister's side and Babs was staring daggers at her mother's nape, who in return was pretending to be too concentrated on driving in order to ignore her daughter. They'd had the beginning of huge fight in the hall of the hospital with Barbara blaming Babs for getting suspended from school and Babs blaming her mother for being  
incommunicado for almost 4 hours while his son needed her.

Now they were almost in Barbara's driveway and not a single word had been said. The silence was deafening, but Jim wasn't sure that it was a bad thing. Lately mother and daughter were opposite forces of nature like hot and cold fronts in the atmosphere, so he'd learned to cherish the quiet moments when they came, even if they were just the calm preceding the storm.

The ringing of his cell phone broke the unnatural silence. It was Bullock reporting the latest developments. Jim told him to go on and tried not to notice Barbara's sudden jerk at his side. He guessed she was just wired up at the idea of having something to prosecute for real. It didn't take Sherlock Holmes to know she was seeing this case as the one launching her political career once and for all.

Harvey's voice wasn't loud, but it filled Barbara's SUV as if it was coming out of the HI-FI speakers. Nothing conclusive had happened in the afternoon. Results from the forensics were late in coming, Flass had met his lawyer, and the interrogation was postponed to the next day. Helena Bertinelli had discovered that Jason Todd's mother had run away with a biker and left him all alone in their trailer in Tricorner park. She and the Social Services office were working over time to find him a temporary accommodation, but it looked bad for the kid. With what happened at school and the fact that there was no one to entrust him to, it looked like reformatory was unavoidable in the kid's immediate future. Jimmy mumbled something that Jim didn't manage to hear, but it didn't seem to carry happiness or relief at the news. That was his son, the sheriff thought, unable to carry a grudge even while aching all over. Even more sad than that was the fact that he too felt sorry for the kid. Damn his soft spot for strays. Too bad the kid was too young to enlist. The Marine Corps would have done him a lot better than a stint in a correctional facility. A military academy, maybe?

Barbara's comment about Todd deserving it disrupted his line of thought and forced him to refocus on the moment. He asked Bullock some other questions and hung up, knowing that his office could hold the fort just fine without him. That soothed his inner 'drill sergeant.' He was still able to train people and get the best out of them.

Barbara stopped the SUV in her driveway, and Jim tried again to ask her if she was sure she didn't want the kids to stay with him. He knew it was useless, but he owed his kids another try. Both Jimmy and Babs preferred his farm: Jimmy for the open spaces and the dogs, and Babs for the miles it put between her and her mother.

“Don't be stupid,” Barbara answered, acidic. “You're never at home.”

“As if you are,” Babs snickered behind Barbara's back, while helping Jimmy getting out of the car.

“I'm getting tired of your attitude, young girl,.” growled Barbara, menacingly.

“How scary, mother. The fear is making the seam of my skirt tremble.”

Jim and Jimmy exchanged a quick but explanatory glance at each other. “Can you stay here with us tonight, dad?” Jimmy asked, accentuating his grimace to pretend he was asking it because of his pain and not because he didn't want to spend the evening hearing his mother and sister screaming at each other.

“He can't.” Barbara responded quickly; maybe too quickly. It made Jim think she didn't want him around and that was strange. Besides the casual sex, they usually were on amicable terms and considering all the events of the day, Jimmy's request didn't sound so uncalled for.

“Your dad has a murder to solve, Jimmy. He's too busy.”

“Not as busy as you, since he found the time to stay with us today,” Babs retorted, pushing again on the same button she'd tried to hit over and over in the hospital. Babs seemed to want to fight with her mother, which was so unlike her that it made Jim even more suspicious.

“At least stay for dinner,” Jimmy intervened, distracting his mother from answering Babs. Jim found his son's reaction time in a crisis impressive, especially knowing he was still a bit stunned by the painkillers.

“Yes, daddy, stay for dinner,.” Babs added, loud enough for their neighbors to catch up the invitation. She smiled evilly when she noticed that Mrs. Duncammen, the block's busybody, had listened and was looking at them from behind her rosemary bush. She knew she had her mother cornered. There was no way prim and proper Barbara Gordon was going to appear rude or less than magnanimous in front of her neighborhood. That was probably the same reason why she had refused to let Jimmy and Babs to go to their father's house. It would have looked bad on her not to be there for her 'poor' son after what happened to him at school.

“Do you have time to eat dinner with us, Jim?” Barbara felt forced to ask, loud enough for Mrs. Duncammen to hear. If Jim had picked up the silent “Say no and go away” concealed in Barbara's tone, he'd decided to ignore it, because he nodded and, for good measure, added a, “Yeah. Everything is quiet at the office.”

Jimmy smiled broadly. Babs looked like the cat who'd eaten the whole Gotham's canary colony and she mouthed a silent, “Serves you right, hypocrite,” behind hers mother's back. Barbara, as usual, didn't betray any emotion, and Jim had the distinct feeling that he'd fallen in the middle of movie without having the slightest idea about what the script was and what were supposed to be his lines.

Out of habit Jim walked straight to the kitchen and started to cook. It'd been one of his chores when he was married and had remained a sort of silent agreement between him and Barbara. When he was around, he cooked. Period. It wasn't that Barbara didn't cook, she did, but she hated it and he was better at it anyway. He chopped onion and carrots, peeled a sausage, and started to prepare his version of Bolognese Sauce. Then he put a pot on the fire for the pasta and went to help Jimmy adjust himself on the sofa. There he saw the two glasses on the small table and the ashtray with a couple of stubs of cigarette. That was strange. If left to Barbara, the death penalty was not enough punishment for the crime of leaving glasses around, and she didn't smoke. Never had. She'd forced him to quit when they were still dating.

Babs came to sit next to her bro and started surfing channels on the TV, but the glance and the half nod she gave him convinced Jim that glasses and ashtray were something she did want him to see. That explained why she'd been so cross with her mother for the whole trip home, and then had dropped any attempt to start a fight the right moment he'd decided to stay for dinner. She wanted him to see something. “Cunning,” Jim thought. “Useless, but cunning.” Babs wanted him to realize that her mother was seeing someone else, but he doubted Barbara was. She never invited him to her bed when she was involved with someone else. That was a rule written in stone in their 'sex buddies' agreement; the only rule that mattered.

Half an hour later, they dined and talked amiably. The tension that had registered in the hospital and in the car totally gone.   
Barbara had promised Babs she'd talk with Snyder to lessen the damages of the suspension, which meant she was going to drill the poor principal a new one and have him thank her for it. In exchange, Babs promised to babysit Jimmy while she was suspended, and Jimmy protested because he was too old for a baby sitter. Babs made up with him, promising she was going to accompany him to the Kane farm to see how Tim was doing as soon as he felt fit enough for it.   
How she was supposed to do so without a driver's license was a mystery Jim didn't want to know about. The fact that, like any farmer's kid in the county, she'd learned to drive tractors as a teen when she still didn't qualify, and that from tractors to cars the passage was almost automatic, was something the county sheriff didn't need to be aware of.

After dinner Jim helped Jimmy to prepare for bed. He washed Jimmy's hair, sponge bathed him around the bandages, helped him change his underwear , and carefully slipped him into his bat themed pajamas. Jimmy was out like a log as soon as his head hit the pillow, but not before he exacted from Jim the promise to come back in the morning to help him some more. Jim didn't need to ask why. He'd been 12 turning 13 once too, and still remembered what it felt like.

“Another one's hitting puberty,” he smiled under his thick mustache, looking at the G.I. Joe doll dressed with an home made bat-suit complete with fully extended bat wings that was towering over Jimmy's desk. The poor doll's fate was sealed as was that of the Bat-man legend. They didn't stand a chance against the power of raging hormones and pretty girls.

He went to give a kiss goodnight to Babs, who was reading a monograph about Julius Caesar, listening to her MP3 player, and text messaging with her cell phone without looking at the display. He wondered why she didn't try to juggle little clubs with her feet while she was at it, but decided not to give voice to that. Knowing Babs, she probably would give it a try just to prove she could. Babs hugged him and told him not to worry, since she was too tired and drained to pick up a fight with her mother. She said she couldn't promise to keep from fighting the next morning when she'd be fresher, but for now the walls and glasses of the house were safe from their screams.   
She laughed when he told her that he was coming back in the morning because Jimmy didn't want to show his blossoming virility to his mother and sister and commented that two hairs didn't qualify for that still.

Finally Jim went looking for Barbara and found her in her bedroom. He smelled the faint aroma of aftershave lingering in the air. It wasn't his. He was about to ask her if she was seeing someone when he noticed it: the little two faced coin. It was on the floor, next to a bed that looked hastily remade but still a bit crumpled.

“Harvey Dent?” He asked, unable to conceal his surprise. He knelt to pick up the coin and looked at it as if it was an ancient find able to prove the existence of an alien species on earth.

“Jim...” Barbara mumbled, aghast.

“You're sleeping with Harvey Dent?”

Barbara stiffened and tried to turn the confrontation in her favor, taking the offensive. “I don't owe you any explanation. We're divorced, in case you've forgotten.”

“Yeah. But we screwed on this same bed just yesterday,” Jim said candidly. He was surprised at the aloofness he'd manage to keep. “And he's married. Not to mention he's the judge who tries your cases.”

He put the coin on the bedside table and started to walk out. He stopped halfway out of the bedroom and watched Barbara. “Where do I fit into this? What am I exactly, the legit cover to your illegitimate affair?”

Surprisingly, Barbara found herself nodding before she managed to stop herself.

“Nice to know...” Jim concluded and walked out. Barbara followed him and stopped him at the door.

“What are you going to do?” She asked, all pretenses of superiority gone and forgotten.

“I don't know, Barbara. I. Really. Don't. Know...”

***

Alfred's HUMMER looked as inconspicuous as an aircraft carrier in a bath tub in the front yard of the Kane farm. Alfred, on the other hand, looked like he belonged to the place, even if in a spiffy, very elegant country squire's kind of way. Bruce couldn't help but notice that the 'gentleman of leisure' attire, with ivory turtleneck sweater, forest green blazer, chinos and leather boots, worked wonders on him. Even the newly restored thin mustache, which reminded Bruce of the first time he'd met him, looked very good on Alfred. The dyed hair, instead, was maybe a bit too much, but at least, this time, he hadn't tried the horrible Raven Black again and had opted for a dark chestnut.   
The kids had found the additions funny. Dick had speculated that Alfred was dating someone, which was more than plausible. Alfred's lady-friends were many and kept augmenting every year. Most of them were still sure they were going to marry him sooner or later, even if they all knew that the Englishman was totally allergic to the word marriage.  
When Tim had asked if his presence in Gotham was due to someone pronouncing the M word, Alfred hadn't answered, but the corners of his mustache had turned up a bit and he had sort of winked. The only reason Tim hadn't laughed aloud had been because it hurt too much to stretch his facial muscles that far.   
Bruce, who was pretty sure that the kids had summoned Alfred, had seen the whole exchange as the ruse it was, but had decided to forgive and forget. After the day he had, he was more than glad to have Alfred around, and so far the old man's presence had been anything but the disaster Bruce had imagined.   
The man had been very supportive during the wait to have Tim discharged from the hospital. He had reacted positively to Gotham in general and to Kane's farm in particular, and his eyebrows had never arched once, not even when he had 'casually' walked into the kitchen.  
He hadn't asked why the place seemed like a battlefield or how they'd managed to live in such chaos, and the attentions he'd devoted to Tim had worked better than the painkillers that the boy could not take.   
Watching the kids glow around Alfred, made Bruce realize that it had been a big mistake to leave him behind in the city. Alfred was part of the family. He should be where the family was. Or maybe the family should be where Alfred was.   
The old English gentleman was an 'opera house and museum' kind of man. Bruce couldn't imagine him living in the 'middle of nothing.'   
Maybe they all should have accepted Alfred's offer to keep on living in the Penthouse.   
Maybe it wasn't too late to accept it now.

“A penny for your thoughts, mas... pardon, Bruce?” Alfred inquired, catching himself before adding the habitual, but no longer welcomed, 'Master.' All of the Wayne's brigade had protested vehemently when he'd used it in the hospital, so he'd promised to get rid of that habit, no matter how hard it'd be.

“He's thinking we should go back to the city,” Tim accused, pouting. “He always has that face when he is thinking we've not cut out for the country.”

Bruce smiled and lifted his hands in mock surrender. “Guilty as charged,” he admitted. “This...” he made an all encompassing gesture to indicate the whole house, “is a far cry from the penthouse.”

Tim grunted, struggling to reconquer the use of his 'R's in spite of his stuffed and hurting nose. “I like here more...” he managed, not without effort.

“Even after today?” Bruce asked, trying not to sound too peeved.

“Yes...”

“OK. Objection noted,” Bruce conceded, ruffling Tim's hair affectionately.

Alfred coughed discretely, as he used to do when he wanted to have his presence noted without intruding in someone else's conversation. “Are you considering returning to the city, Ma... Bruce?”

“Sometimes,.” Bruce admitted.

“Only when he's awake,” Tim corrected, fighting hard to keep from smiling and hurt his lip again. “He keeps missing the penthouse.”

“Doesn't that lip give you problems speaking, brat?” Bruce rebutted, but with no real disappointment in his voice. All he kept thinking about was that if Tim was this sharp and sarcastic, he couldn't have a concussion and that was the only real important thing.

“Well. I wish I had known about it before I sold it.”   
Alfred delivered that news with his usual, very British aplomb. Tim's smile went so big he split his lip and had to press his fingers on the cut.

“You sold the penthouse?” Bruce demanded, astounded.

“I'm afraid so, Sir.”

“Can you drop the 'Sir'?”

“I'll try, Sss.... pardon, Mas... pardon again... Too many changes for a single day, Bruce.”  
Both men smiled at each other.

“Why did you sell the penthouse, Alfred?” Bruce asked again.

“It was too cumbersome for a man of my station, sir. The Russian 'gentleman' who bought it offered almost twice its real value, and I wanted some liquidity.”

“ Alfred...” Bruce had serious difficulty coming to terms with all that. Why did Alfred need three millions dollars in cash? “I'm speechless.”

“You shouldn't be, S... pardon again... Bruce. I just wanted some pocket money to invest.”

“Three million isn't pocket money.”

“Three million and half.”   
Bruce and Tim's jaws dropped.

“I apologize for my poor choice of words. It came to my attention that I could conclude an interesting transaction soon, and I didn't want to touch the stock titles you're managing for me or some other of my assets. The Penthouse seemed to be the most expendable asset. ”

“Other assets?” Bruce kept looking more and more surprised with every passing minute. Next to him, Tim was regretting the lack of a video camera to record the whole scene and show it to Dick once he got back from buying dinner at the take away. He was missing the show of the year.  
“Which other assets, Alfred? I'm watching your investments, and I'm unaware of other assets.”

“You're watching some of my investments, Bruce. Not all of them. Since your field of expertise is the stock market, I didn't see the utility to bother you with my other interests.”

“Other interests?”

“Buildings. Years ago I discovered a penchant for buying old buildings, restoring them, and renting them for a right price. Gentrification of some areas had made their value increase during the years. Most of them have already payed their initial mortgage and are producing nice profits.”

Bruce imagined that his expression should be, by now, the silliest he'd ever showed. His eyebrows had climbed so high on his forehead that they'd started to hurt. “ How many?” he asked.

“Buildings? Seven here in the States...”

“And in England?” Asked Tim, quicker than Bruce to catch the slight quivering in the Englishman.

“Just four, Timothy.”

“Where?”

“Two in London, one in Manchester and one in Edinburgh.”

“You must be very rich then.”

“Yes, Timothy. I'm embarrassed to admit it, but I can't deny that I'm richer than I allowed you all to believe... Several times richer.”

Bruce felt suddenly elated. He'd been afraid of playing the market with what he believed were Alfred's savings. He'd done a good job with them, but the fear of making his beloved tutor poorer had accompanied him from the start. This last development put everything in a lighter perspective. “Why didn't you tell me?”

“You never asked.” Alfred answered as usual, totally unruffled, even if the tip of his pencil thin mustache curled up a tiny fraction of an inch. Tim clutched his mouth with his free hand to keep from laughing and splitting his lip cut further. Bruce felt like Wodehouse's Bertie Wooster: silly and outsmarted, but in a good kind of way.

“Now, if you will excuse me, I'm going to take possession of my room.”

“You really want to sleep here?” Bruce asked, even more astonished. The thought of Alfred sleeping in that old and decrepit shack had never ever touched his mind till that moment. It seemed so unreal.

“Why not? The house seems big enough.”

“It's just a tad above a barn, Alfred.”

Alfred smiled fondly and patted Bruce on the shoulder. “Bruce. You're living under the erroneous impression that I may belong to some remote branch of the Windsor family. Let me assure you that nothing is further from the truth than that,” he winked conspiratorially with Tim. “I've been a soldier and a spy. I've slept in jungles and swamps, and ate spiders and newts. Your cozy and warm little house is far above my station and my merits.”

Dick arrived some minutes later carrying several take away cartons. He declared enthusiastically all his love for the Tumbler and his desire to buy it from Mr. Brakeman.   
He found Alfred intent on transferring Bruce's SIM card into one of his Blackberries, and Bruce protesting that it was not necessary. As usual, Alfred wasn't budging, and Bruce's protests were not really heartfelt. From the outside it seemed mostly a gamesome bickering between father and son.

“What have I missed?” Dick asked.

“Nothing. Alfred took over,” Tim answered. “ And Bruce stopped brooding.”

“Wow... That's an achievement.”

“Told you we needed Alfred.”

“Who doesn't?”

As if to prove that Alfred was right as of habit, Bruce's 'new' cell phone started to ring in the exact moment Alfred handed it to him. Bruce excused himself and retreated in the kitchen, leaving Alfred and and the kids intent on dealing with the dinner.   
When he came back, he looked suddenly more sullen and thoughtful. He looked across the room at Dick and Tim and wondered if it was better to keep the information to himself, but he knew it was already too late when Dick asked what was wrong. He berated his inability to conceal his emotions better. He had used to be a lot better at it, but that was a long time ago.   
He sat at the table and decided that truth was still the best he could offer to his family.“It was Ralph Dibny from the FBI,” he admitted ruefully. “They've found Morris Grant.”

Bruce saw what the information meant to Dick, Tim, and even Alfred, by just looking in their eyes. There was surprise followed by hope. They all knew what it meant for him. With Grant back in custody, there was finally a chance to recover the money he'd stolen and go back the the life they all used to live. They all were happy for him, and Bruce felt bad to have to strip them of that moment.

“He's dead,” he had to add.

“What?” Dick shook his head. Part of his mind had already caught the implications. With Grant dead, the chances to discover where he'd hidden the money were next to nil. Another part of his mind, instead, was telling him that he had wished death upon Napier and Grant and both were dead. He didn't believe in that kind of bad mojo, Dick reminded that annoying voice, but in order to stay on the safe side he agreed that it was wiser to stop wishing death to anybody.

“They found him in Scotland,” Bruce kept on narrating, trying to dissimulate his real feelings with a sort of detached, aloof tone of voice. He knew he was fooling no one, but right that moment it was all he had to keep himself from starting to scream. “There'd been a chase after he ran, when Dibny went to arrest him. Grant's car lost control and fell off a cliff. It fell for hundreds of meters down the slope and hit first a High voltage pylon and then a tanker full of gasoline. There'd been an explosion, but Dibny thinks he was already dead at the time.”

“Why?” asked Alfred, his proverbial aplomb faltering. Like everybody else, he hated what Grant had done to the Wayne Enterprise and to Bruce, but he couldn't forget that the man had been, or pretended to be, his friend for more than two decades.

“They found a mix of bones, gray matter, and blood splattered around the pylon down to the point where the car hit the tanker. They're conducting tests right now, but so far the DNA matches.”

“Talk about bad Karma,” commented Tim, a bit shaken. “What does it mean for us, Bruce?”

“That nothing is going to change, Tim. We needed Morris Grant to find the money and save the Wayne Enterprise. With him dead and without the codes and location of his 'hidden treasure,' we're stuck exactly where we are now, just permanently.”

“So we're going to stay here in Gotham?” Tim insisted. There was no mistake about where his vote would be, if they decided to vote about staying or moving back to the city.

“I don't know, yet. Here or anywhere else is the same.”

“Since we're already here, we can give it a real try now,” added Dick. Bruce took notice of another vote already cast.

“Don't worry,” he conceded,. “whatever we decide to do, nothing will be done till school is over. I won't make you change it three times in a year.”

That was enough to placate the boys. They were sure that by the end of the school year, Bruce probably would have finally attuned with the place.

The rest of the dinner proceeded in relatively calm silence. Nobody was in the mood to talk after such a bad news and that was understandable. Alfred made a call to inform Lucius Fox of the latest developments. Dick offered Tim a hand to get ready for bed, and the kids disappeared together upstairs. Bruce retreated in what was becoming his favorite place in the house: the back porch.  
He had so much to think about. In the last months, he had clung to the tiny hope that one day he'd get his life and his family empire back, but now everything was lost and, in absence of a forensic accounting's miracle, probably for good. There was no way back, and he was confused. He should have been more desperate about it. Instead he wasn't. He felt sad, gloom, brooding, but not desperate.

“Probably...” he mused, “it doesn't hurt so much the second time.”

He put both hands on the balustrade and looked at the stars. They were so beautiful. Nothing as beautiful as that could be seen from the city, not even from the top of the Penthouse. Too much light and noise in the city and not just the buzz of mosquitoes and grasshoppers, smell of cow manure, bumpy roads, and rednecks in the country.   
For the first time since he'd moved to Gotham, he wondered if there was something for a graduate in economics to do in a place like that.

“Another penny for your thoughts, Bruce?” Alfred approached him, silent as usual. He reached for the balustrade too and looked in the same direction as Bruce.

Bruce smiled imperceptibly. “I'm going to pin a bell on your shoes one of these days, Alfred. And a penny is too much for what's on my mind.”

“Let me be the judge of it.”

“I wanted to become a doctor, like Dad. Morris insisted I chose economics and managing. I wonder why?”

“I can't answer that, Bruce. I don't know when Morris became a thief and a swindler, but I don't think it goes so far back in time. Lucius and I would have noticed, and what he did caught us as by surprise as much as you.”

“A doctor would blend more easily into a place like this than a money handler who has already lost a company.”

“You didn't lost your company, Bruce.” Alfred's voice was subdued as usual, but it carried enough determination to get through the fog of Bruce's mind like a bullet. “It's been stolen from you, while you were in a coma and incapacitated to counteract. We all know Grant would have failed if you were on the watch. And it wasn't your company, Bruce. It was just something your great grandfather built from scratch. Nothing keeps you from doing the same.”

“I'm not so sure.”

“Of course you're not, son. You're hurt. What made you such a shark in the stock market arena was your ability to trust your instinct. You can't overcome the trauma of having misjudged both Morris and Selina and that keeps you paralyzed. You've gone through the motions since the moment you learned what happened to the Wayne Enterprise, and this is not you at all.”

Bruce didn't dare to interrupt. Alfred was in a roll, and he'd called him son and both facts were enough to make him speechless.

“You're allowed to whine and brood, but not for much longer. The Bruce Wayne I know will roll up his sleeves soon and build something new, here or in the city, it doesn't matter. The Bruce Wayne I know is skilled enough to buy all this county piece after piece. I'm surprised he hasn't already.”

“You think so?”

”That's a pointless question. Even in your actual state, you managed to do wonders with Timothy and Richard and that's no small achievement.”

“You think they're doing fine?”

“Besides today's scuffle, which could have happened everywhere, as you well know.” Alfred produced his version of a smirk, which consisted of an eighth of an inch lift of the right corner of his mouth.   
Bruce smiled. He'd been in one of the most exclusive and uptight schools in the Country, and he'd spent the first year there fist fighting against Oliver Queen and the next ones fist fighting alongside Oliver Queen. Admittedly he'd never been beaten as hard as Tim, but he wasn't going to hold it against Gotham.

“Young Timothy looks a lot happier, and he seems very close to his friend Jimmy.” Alfred continued. “Richard is still his usual self, but he seems quite fond of a young girl with long red hair. He was telling Timothy about how she hit someone named Jason Todd and there was something in his voice... Even young Timothy noticed it. I think it's a very interesting development in his emotional state.”

“So, they're fine.”

“Yes, they are. And you will be too.”

“Wish I had the confidence in me that you have, Alfred.”

“You haven't seen the half of it, son.” Alfred's demeanor reminded Bruce why the old man was still so loved and respected between his fellow soldiers.  
“I'm going to give you full access to my possessions: the three and half million cash, the stock market shares, the buildings. We're going to merge all that with this cozy farm and make a new company of which I'll be the major partner until you'll be able to buy me out. And we both know you'll manage.”

“Why, Alfred?”

“Because you, Timothy, and Richard are all the family I have, and I want to see you build something for you and the kids. You only have to give yourself a good shake and choose what do you want to do.   
If you wish to move back to the city, I can, and I will be honored to, help you settle up there. I think I must have the right apartment for you in one of the buildings, if you really want to come back.  
The same is also true if you decide to remain here in the country. Nothing will make me happier than helping you built your new life in this nice and characteristic place.”  
Bruce snorted, but Alfred kept talking as if nothing had happened.

“I'm going to leave you this evening to finish brooding, and whining and doing whatever depressing thing you've done so far. Then, come tomorrow, we're going to start kicking some arses. Do we have an agreement?”

Bruce's head was spinning, but he nodded. “I think we have.” He patted Alfred's shoulder affectionately. “Now, if you will excuse me, my new partner has given me just few hours of brooding and whining and I'm going to make the best of them if they're the last I'll get for a very long while.”

“Very good, SIR.” Alfred stretched the word 'Sir' in a jokingly kind of way and retreated inside the house.

Bruce waited a few minutes, still trying to come to terms with all that had happened in that crazy day and what was expected from him starting from the next one. There was so much to digest that his brain refused to go any further, so Bruce walked in, rummaged into one of the many cardboard boxes still spread in the kitchen and found what he was looking for: the most expensive bottle of Johnnie Walker Blue Label Anniversary he'd saved from his father's collection. He had imagined keeping it hidden here and bring it back to the office of the Wayne Enterprise the day he'd regained his company, but now he thought that was a pointless use for it. Getting wonderfully drunk seemed a lot more appealing, and the best way to kill that part of himself that was still too gloom and brooding to let him appreciate the wonderful gift that Alfred had just bestowed to him.  
He picked up several glasses and stepped out of the kitchen. He sat on the old swing in the backyard's veranda and contemplated in turn the starred sky and the seal of the old bottle. Getting drunk wasn't a real solution, and he knew it.

“Well,” he told himself, “ I' won't go totally plastered, then. Just a bit high.”

“Have you broken the seal, yet?” asked Alfred, sneaking out again.

“Not yet. But I'm going to,” answered Bruce. “And I'm really going to pin a bell on your shoes.”

“May I remind you what happened the last time you got drunk?” Alfred's tone was not judgmental, and in that way managed to look even more so.

Bruce groaned. “I wasn't drunk when I married Selina. Neither was I when I bedded her the first time.”

“If you say so...”

“The worst that can come is an hangover, and we have your concoction for that,” Bruce insisted. “Look around, Alfred. Unless you count the rooster, the chickens, and the cows out there, it's not like there is a real risk of picking up and bedding some stranger here.”

Alfred looked unconvinced, but not really preoccupied. “Very good, then. I'll let you and your bottle alone.”

“Thanks Alfred. And Alfred...”

“Yes, Bruce?”

“Have I just jinxed myself?”

“Probably. But since Selina Kile isn't around, I think there aren't any real risks,” Alfred nodded. “ And since that bottle is valued at three thousands dollars, I'd be grateful if you leave some for me to taste too.”

They laughed, and finally Alfred went back inside, but not before noticing the lights of a car advancing slowly from the far end of the propriety. He smiled. Just because the boy had jinxed himself, it didn't mean that troubles were bound to come. After all, he admitted after looking again from his room's window, it was just a patrol car of the sheriff, probably come to inquire about Tim's misadventure.


	17. Chapter 17

“Here's someone looking gloomier than me,” Bruce and Jim Gordon both thought, looking at each other across the small space between Bruce's backyard porch and Jim's car. Unknown to each other, they both also reached the same conclusion: “Misery loves company.”

Jim tried for a smile that wasn't very convincing, threw his hat on the back seat of the car and loosened his neck tie. Bruce nodded at him and broke the seal of his too expensive bottle of whiskey.

“Drowning your sorrows?” Jim asked.

“Trying to. Want some?” answered Bruce.

“Can use one... Or many.”

“I know the feeling.” If any one of them noted the informality of the whole exchange, they didn't mentioned it. They both sat, Bruce on the swing and Jim on the stool in front of it.   
Bruce started to pour two abundant doses of the expensive liquor and passed a glass to Jim. The older man mumbled a thank you and swallowed his first sip.

“Woah... this bitch kicks a mean punch,” he commented.

Bruce mimicked the sheriff, initially unconvinced, but changed his mind quickly. “This shit can make fake teeth melt,” he agreed and both smiled, a bit more sincerely this time.

“How's Tim?” Jim asked, finally justifying his coming to Kane's farm at the late hour. Not that he needed to. Bruce had figured it out the moment he'd seen the car turning onto the dirty road.

“Dented all over and suffering, but he's soldiering up as usual. Kid's a rock. Jimmy?”

“The same. Couple of broken ribs and bruises everywhere, but pain notwithstanding, he's doing fine.”

“Tim's got a broken arm, twisted nose, and eyes so black he looks like he's wearing a mask, but I'm pretty sure he's going to wear them all as a badge of honor as soon as I'll let him go back to school.”

Jim nodded understandingly and, mimicking Bruce, sipped another mouthful of whiskey. “I'm sorry Tim got involved.”

“Don't be. This kind of shit happens. We all could have done without, but they're not the first, and surely not the last, kids to get involved in a fist fight.” Bruce pondered his last sentence for the time necessary to sip another mouthful and then smirked, “I used to be fighting at least a couple of times a week.”

“Same here... My dad called it our damn Irish temper.” They laughed together.

“After a while my principal put me and Queen on the wrestling team and ordered us to put our energy to a use that wasn't beating each other to a pulp.”

“Let me guess. You did win the championship...”

“Not even close. We had a lot of fun, but didn't make such an impression on the team. We were both too temperamental for that. We didn't wrestle on the mat, we just kept on brawling with whoever was in front of us.”  
Jim hid behind his glass to cover a sudden uneasiness. Why was listening to Bruce talking about his friend Queen making him so irked? Was that jealousy? “No way,” he told himself and emptied his glass.

“This might be expensive,” he commented, while Bruce refilled both glasses.

“Yup. I could have sold it and used the money to get a contractor.”

“That much?”

“Yeah. Sip it slowly. Each glass must be valued more or less than a week of work for us both.”  
The realization hit them both like a punch, but that didn't keep them from sipping again.   
Jim had to ask: “Why are we drinking it, then?”

“I'm celebrating,” Bruce answered, and to make a point of it, he took another mouthful. Jim followed suit. He was starting to feel a bit lightheaded, but that was better than how he felt when he'd arrived.

“Celebrating what?”

“Let's see. I found a dead body, I've been held at gun point by a deranged officer of the law, and I've been mauled by the press. Then a bully hit my son, FBI called to say that Morris Grant had died, taking with him the secret of where he's hidden the money he's stolen, and Alfred sort of ordered me to get my thumbs out of my ass and start doing something with the rest of my life.”  
The sum of all that made Bruce grin bitterly and look at the amber liquid in his glass. Sipping didn't seem fast enough anymore, so he swallowed all the content in one single swoop.

“Up to the bully hitting our sons, our day's been pretty much the same. I don't have a butler to throw in mix, but I can relaunch with an ex wife who's used me as a smoke curtain to cover her illicit affair with a married man.” Jim drank the whole content of his glass too and clinked his empty glass with Bruce's, who poured a new refill.

“The judge?” He asked, and Jim nodded.

“How do you know...”

“The way he was acting around her this morning an THE BREAKFAST.”

“What a good sheriff I am. Totally missed that until I found myself sniffing sex out of Barbara's bedsheets.”

“I've been married for four years and missed how my wife was draining my bank accounts dry one after another. Guess I was too pussy-whipped to notice.”

“Ain't that the truth?” Jim smirked. “To us. Hopelessly pussy-whipped morons.”

“To us.” Bruce agreed and they clinked the glasses together before swallowing.  
“Do you still love your ex?” he asked, his 's' starting to come out a little slurred.

“Do you still love yours?” Even Jim's sibilants were starting to get slurred.

“I asked first,” Bruce chuckled. “And officially Selina's still my wife. Not for long, mind you. I've signed for a unilateral divorce. Another round?” he concluded, pointing at the bottle.  
“Why not. I'm halfway drunk already, and I don't like jobs half done.”  
Bruce started to pour again.

“So, why are you still screwing your ex?”

“Who said I'm still doing it?”

“You wouldn't be so pissed off otherwise.”

“Damn you, Sherlock, nothing escapes you,” Jim guffawed. “I really should hire you.”

“Too late for that. Got a job offer from Alfred already, and I'm going to take it.”   
They both sipped again.

“The question still stands. Why are you fucking your ex wife?”

“'Have you seen her? Who wouldn't?” Jim remained silent for a moment, sipped some more whiskey, and continued. “Always wondered why she kept wanting to fuck me after the divorce, but I guess I know now.”

“You can't be that bad yourself...” Bruce managed, not without effort, to keep from adding “with that package you're carrying.”   
He breathed slowly and continued. “She's still doing you while doing the other guy, so there's a good chance the blond guy is the one feeling inadequate... And if I can still use a word like inadequate, I'm not getting drunk fast enough.”   
Both men laughed and swallowed in perfect synchronism. They looked at each other, both noticing that the other man's pupils were getting expanded and liquid. The booze was starting to kick in at full speed.

“So Grant is dead...” Jim mumbled when the silence between them started to get boring.

“Yeah...”

“And the Wayne's Enterprise?”

“Dead with him. I'm sure I'll be able to scratch some dimes out of it, but it'll take years.”

“In the meanwhile?”

“Going to take Alfred's offer and start managing his money. Not Wayne's billions, but we're talking millions nonetheless.”

“Are you going to move back to the city?”

“Not sure. Not much to go back to there... Kids like here... And I'm starting to like it too.” Without realizing it, he gave Jim a meaningful once over that the older man missed just because he was as drunk as the youngster.

“I'm glad you're staying...” Jim blushed, but he couldn't say if it was for the admission or for the alcohol running rampant in his blood.

“Really? Why?”

“Because....” Jim stuttered. He tried again. “Because I like you,” he confessed. “I'm a waste at making friends, but with you it's so easy... I may be getting even a little infatuated by you.” Jim berated his intoxicated brain for deciding that was the perfect time to loosen his tongue. “I can't believe I just said that aloud.”

Bruce smiled drunkenly. “I like you too, sheriff...” He started laughing. “You're just too damn fine looking.... Too bad I'm straight or I'd make a pass at you right now.”

“Did you ever...” Jim started to ask, felt embarrassed, and hid himself in another sip from the glass.

“Did I ever what?” Asked Bruce, taking another sip too. They both were getting happily plastered and didn't seem to mind.

“It doesn't matter.”

“Come on. Ask away...”

“Did you ever made a pass to a man? I can't help wondering if you and Queen did ever...” Jim couldn't force himself to finish that sentence to save his life.

Bruce mulled the phrase in his head for a bit, sipped some more and when the realization came, he started to laugh. Whiskey came out of his nostrils and he had to force himself to stop coughing. In a far away corner of his mind, the thought that he was too loud and running the risk to wake up the kids and Alfred surfaced, but disappeared as quickly as it'd come.

“Me and Ollie?” he kept on giggling. “ Well... Does a contest about who's bigger count?” he waited for an answer that Jim didn't offer. “I guess not, then. You?”

“Me what?”

“Have you ever made a pass to someone from your own gender?”

“Sadly no. Too straight or too uptight for that.”

“Strange. Always thought there was a reason why there was a 'soldier' in the Village People.”

Jim guffawed. “Of course there was. All those men all together in those barracks... Believe me, I've seen my share of dicks in the showers, if that's what you mean. Just didn't do anything for me.”

“Never thought about trying?”

Jim pondered the question longer than he would have done if sober. “Going horizontal with a man? No.”

“You don't need to go horizontal. You can get a blow job standing on your feet.” Bruce laughed.

“True...” Jim admitted. “Did you?”

“Do it with a guy? Nope. Thought about it? Sometimes. If it were so bad, the practice would have been lost and forgotten a long time ago.”

“Can't argue with that logic.” Jim smile turned melancholic. “Do dreams count?”

“As what?”

“As thinking about it...”

“The hell if I know...”

“I dreamed about you last night,” Jim confessed. He blushed even more, berated his drunkenness for making him say things he wanted to keep for himself, and thanked it because it'd give him an excuse to deny everything in the morning.

“Were we?” Asked Bruce mimicking with the hands the act of coupling.

“Sort of...”

“No real thing?

“I'm not sure... ”

“Then I beat you. We did it in my dream...”

Jim hid a smile behind the glass he brought to his mouth, but his mustache gave him away nonetheless. “You dreamed of us too?”

“Yeah... We were wolves...”

“Wolves?” Jim broke into a bellyful laugh.

“Yup, but we turned humans just before going at it. Guess there's enough for a shrink.” He drank another sip of liquor. “I can't believe we're talking about this.”

Jim nodded. “Thanks god we're drunk. Probably we won't remember a thing in the morning.”

“Not so sure, but I'm going to stick with it anyway.”

They sat, looking at each other for a bit, whatever remained to say kept with great effort under lid. They gave a cursory glance at the bottle and found it empty. Jim saw that as the signal that it was time to leave. He tried to stand up and failed spectacularly. He fell back on his stool grinning.

“Damn. I'm wasted,” he declared, as solemnly as someone as drunk as him could manage, and then broke into another laugh.

“ Can't let you drive like that...” commented Bruce, trying to stand up too. The oscillations of the swing made the attempt even more impossible. He let himself fall back on the swing and cursed.

“Damn. I so wanted to go wake up Chester,” he declared.

“Chester?”

“The rooster. Want to give him a taste of his own medicine.”

“Won't work.”

“I know... But it seems fun.”

“If you say so...”

“Want to come with me?”

“Of course...”

They both tried again to stand up, and both lost their equilibrium at the same time. Bruce reached out and grabbed Jim's arm. The older man didn't have in him the strength to try to hold up them both. Truth be told he didn't have enough to hold up himself, so he went with the motion and fell forward, partly on the swing and partly on top of Bruce. They both started giggling.

“It's official... We're drunk...” Bruce said, stupidly.

They realized at exactly the same second that they were too damn close. Jim was lying no more than a hair's breadth away from Bruce, his mustache so close it was tickling the younger man's upper lip. They both gulped for air. A flush of color stained their cheeks and their eyes widened, the pupils dilating as they stared at each other.  
Bruce talked first, his tone so low he almost didn't hear himself saying: “If I were not straight, I'd kiss you right now.”

Jim heard anyway. “If I were not straight, I'd let you do it,” he whispered in answer.

Bruce tried to tell himself to back off, but he couldn’t. Wouldn’t. Something more powerful than common sense pulled him toward Jim, heated his blood, drew him to that irresistible mouth. He realized he'd wanted a taste of that mouth from the moment they'd met, and now, he couldn’t think of a single reason he shouldn’t take that taste.

Jim's lips parted slightly and Bruce took the action as a silent invitation. He reached out and touched Jim's lips with his own before he could lose the nerve.   
Soft, strange, different from everything he'd tried before. All and more than he had bargained for. A warning bell sounded somewhere in the back of his mind, but desire swept through like a flood and drowned the alarm, leaving nothing but that incredible heat in its wake. He tangled a fist in Jim's hair and tilted his head back, looking for a better access and angle.

Jim gasped slightly at the shock of their bodies coming together, at the surprise of those lips touching his. Without thinking he slid his tongue slowly into the warmth of Bruce's mouth. They kissed slowly, deeply, taking possession of each other, staking a claim. They swept hands down each other's back, cupped a feel of each other's buttocks, tried vaguely and absent-mindedly to make their groins connect and grind.   
They trembled and groaned, barely aware that they were making the sound. Jim couldn’t remember the last time he'd felt like this. It thrilled him, and frightened him, and made him burn with need.

Bruce felt dizzy in a way that had very little to do with the booze and a whole lot to do with the man he was holding for dear life and fighting with for dominance.   
Their kiss went on and on till there was no air to breathe, and they had to decide if it was better to stop or pass out for lack of oxygen.   
They parted, both groaning their reluctance to stop there.

“Wow!” Bruce murmured.

“Wow!” echoed Jim

Bruce looked Jim in the eyes and smiled. “I think straightness is too overrated,” he whispered, slurring all the 's' .

“I couldn't agree more...” Confirmed Jim, and with surprising speed he rolled more on top, pinning Bruce beneath him.

Bruce welcomed the replay as Jim slowly lowered his head and brought their lips together again. Softly, they merely caressed each other lips, then deepened the kiss, their tongues fighting playfully in an exchange of shared passion. They tasted whiskey out of each other mouths, but didn't care at all.   
They surrendered to the moment, hands roaming about, searching for more contact.   
Jim kissed Bruce long and deeply, one hand caressing his cheek then gliding slowly down his body.   
Slowly, sensuously, Bruce unbuttoned the top button of Jim's shirt, and then the second. He tried to kiss his way down the older man's throat, but Jim protested with a low growl and went back to find Bruce's mouth and the kiss they were sharing. They didn't even try to say it aloud, but they both felt like flying, and the sensation was better than anything they had ever imagined.


	18. Chapter 18

Jim Gordon woke up and groaned. Pain stabbed at his temples, and it felt as if all the helicopters of 'Apocalypse Now' were flying inside his head, dropping bombs all around while Wagner's 'Die Valkure' played too loudly in the background.   
He groaned again. Slowly he opened one eye, and then closed it hastily as light stabbed at him.   
Whimpering, he opened his eyes again, then frowned. There was a large, shirtless chest on his line of vision, or at least it seemed like a chest: a male chest. The absence of boobs and the presence of hard muscles was sort of a gender's dead giveaway.  
Jim searched his memory but could not find anything there to explain the reason of such an unusual scenario. He shook his head slightly to clear it, and the pain that washed over him made him groan again and curse everything related to alcohol, from the process of distillation of the mean thing to the sand necessary to produce the bottles where it was usually preserved.

“OK...” he admitted. “It's a hangover.” But knowing that didn't explain the presence of a male chest next to him, nor why a hand that seemed to belong to an arm casually attached to HIS shoulder was rubbing gentle circles on the side of said chest and getting pleasant vibes out of that.   
It took him several moments of concerted effort to bring his eyes into focus, but after several blinks he managed to get the picture clear into view. He stared at the chest in the bed, then lifted his head a fraction at a time, and looked at the shoulders, neck, and head. It was Bruce Wayne. An unmoving, silent, somewhat undressed Bruce Wayne.   
Jim waited for the foreseeable bout of homophobic panic to attack him.

“Any time now...” He sort of encouraged the apparently shy anxiety to manifest itself. He kept waiting and waiting, but nothing came.

“Interesting...” he admitted absent-mindedly. “Unexpected, but interesting. I'm in bed with Bruce Wayne, and I seem to be OK with it... Must be a secondary effect of the booze.”

Jim's eyes wandered down toward the bedsheets, lying loosely over Bruce's hips. He was lying on his side, one hand under the covers, the other resting across Jim's side, close to the hip bone.

“The touching is mutual,” Jim's mind registered didactically, still processing any new information a slow frame at a time. “From outside, the subjects seem to be loosely embracing each other. How cute.”

Jim frowned at the alien thought and moaned for the pain the action gave him. He stared some more, squinting his eyes to compensate for the absence of his glasses. He realized distantly that Bruce Wayne's chest was almost hairless, probably shaved or waxed, and sporting an impressive amount of muscle. It also looked like Bruce's nakedness continued beneath the sheets, but Jim couldn't tell for sure without moving them away and just the thought of moving, even only his fingers, was enough to give him dizziness.   
The Calvin Klein briefs dangling haphazardly on the floor lamp next to the bed, along with a pair of military green boxers, seemed to prove his theory anyway.

“Wait a minute.” Jim's befuddled brain clicked into gear. Military green boxers. “Oops...” Slowly, very slowly, he glanced down at himself, and groaned again softly. He was naked too.

“Of course,” his mind told him pedantically. “Why should Bruce be the only one naked.” Jim told his mind to shut the hell up and start working as it was supposed to do. “Fat chance...” his mind answered.

Jim shot Bruce another furtive look. He found the sight of the other man's chest rising and falling, slowly and steadily, very comforting. He wondered again why he wasn't panicking yet.   
He should be on the run already, or at least trying to untangle himself from the guy, instead he felt prone to inch a bit closer and augment the skin contact. Not that there was a real lack of it. Aside from their arms on each other's hips, it seemed like they were holding hands under the sheets, and that, Jim admitted, was cute beyond belief. Just to prove it, he ordered his hand to squeeze a little and as expected, another hand squeezed back.   
“Yes,” he mentally nodded and smiled even if in reality, his facial muscles didn't moved a bit. “Definitively cute.”

Then Chester crowed, as loud as a cannon.   
Despite his better efforts, Jim boggled in surprise, and the sudden motion made him inch forward and touch something cylindrical and hard with something also cylindrical and also hard, apparently attached someway to his own pelvic area.

“There must be a fencing tournament down there,” his mind mocked his confusion.  
He wanted to start a serious bitching with his undisciplined mind, but the second crow from the lousy cock (“no pun intended”, his mind laughed at him) made Bruce's hand twitch and fall down the slope of Jim's hip. On the way down it found Jim's erection and, probably unconsciously, it grasped it loosely but resolutely.   
Jim let out a muffled squeak, and a shiver run down his spine. Next to him Bruce mumbled something croaked and barely understandable that sounded, more or less, like, “I'm gonna strangle that fucking cock.”   
Then he woke up.

Bruce found himself staring into a very surprised pair of blue eyes. He blinked a couple of times, and then slowly glanced around, wincing slightly. His gaze took in the room, the bed, the two bodies so close together. Then his attention was captivated by the heat coming from the palm of his hand and curiosity made him trying to investigate its source. Shock poured through him, followed by something that his mind failed to identify when he realized that he was definitively holding an erect penis, and in the next instance, it wasn't his.   
He met Jim's gaze again. An uncomfortable silence, broken only by the third and last cry from Chester, ensued.

It felt like a lifetime, but was probably only a matter of seconds before Bruce managed to make a tiny bit of order in the confusion of his mind.   
It had been staggering enough to wake up so traumatically, while still victim of the father and mother of all the hangovers, but to find himself stark naked, with an also naked Jim Gordon beside him, and with Jim's maleness literally in his hand was, sure as hell, way too much.  
Maybe it was just a dream.   
He moved his head slightly, and became suddenly convinced that it was going to fall off. Pain lanced through him. Definitely not a dream.

“In that case...” he looked down in the general direction of his hand. He should move it away. The sooner the better.  
Some nerve-ending must have tried to obey the disjointed commands of his brain, because his fingers twitched and Jim moaned, his blue eyes widening as he  
stared, unmoving, at him.

“All right,” Bruce recognized. “It's not dream. I'm definitely awake. I'm definitely naked and lying next to a similarly unclothed man. And it seems like I'm fondling him. This is definitely a new experience.”

Then Bruce noticed that there was a part of him that, contrarily to the rest of his useless body, was obviously still in excellent working order and was playfully bumping heads against the same object that his hand was, apparently against his will, still holding.   
In a way that he hoped was unobtrusive, he tried to inch backward with his pelvis and to raise his knees slightly. Something went spectacularly wrong because, as a result, he found himself molded even more closely against Jim, their bodies touching from navels to knees and their traitorous appendages making an even more intimate acquaintance.   
Judging by the way those two damn things were throbbing against each other, they were having a lot more fun than the rest of their owners' bodies.   
Bruce looked at Jim, who hadn't moved or breathed since he had awakened, and they stared at each other for a while, still a bit shocked. Bruce swallowed, tried to speak and desisted. As an afterthought, he investigated the new position of his hand. Somewhere along the disastrous way, it had moved from Jim's dick and gone back to his hip, but since they were a lot closer now, it had slipped over and gone to rest over Jim's firm buttock. At the same time Jim's hand had slipped over his buttock and was spiderly kneading it with the tips of his fingers.  
All in all, Bruce admitted distractedly, it was very nice, but a part of his mind was protesting that his first (maybe second if their actual nakedness was a clue) venture into the realm of gay sex was, so far, an experience that parts of his body were having while the rest of it was too busy being hangover, and that wouldn't do.

Bruce admitted defeat and moved his head fractionally to nod to Jim. The older man did the same, and appealing to all their meager strength, they clashed their chests together and used the momentum to bounce and fall on their backs, next to each other but no longer touching. The effort and the trauma of the sudden movement made them both groan and grimace in pain.  
Bruce looked at the room making somersaults in front of his eyes, and in a moment of pure agony, whispered the only name that usually he associated to salvation: Alfred.  
His voice was so low and strained that he barely heard himself, but on the final D the door magically opened itself and Alfred glided in noiselessly, carrying not one, but two jugs full to the brim of a brown, vicious, evil looking, probably sentient concoction.

“Good morning, Sirs,” the old man smiled pleasantly, nodding first to Bruce then to Bruce's guest with his usual unflappable aplomb. “I took the liberty of providing a balm for your actual predicament, Sirs. If you'd be so kind to allow me to help you sit and drink it, I'm sure you'll be pleasantly surprised by the result.”

Jim felt himself starting to redden. He raised his knees slightly, allowing the sheet to form a concealing tent around his mid section. Then he clenched his teeth, swallowed deeply, looked at the old man, and with all the dignity he could muster, mumbled a very croaked and suffering, “good Morning... Mister?”

Alfred's mouth curved into an imperceptible smile, and he walked slowly toward Jim's side of the bed and put the jug on the bedside table. He extended his hand to help Jim sit up.

“Pennyworth, sir. Alfred Pennyworth,” he introduced himself.

"Jim... Jim Gordon," Jim half stuttered. He felt like a fourteen year old caught red handed by his girlfriend's father, and he had to admit that, age and gender notwithstanding, that was pretty much what had happened. Silently he cursed himself: of all the possible ways to meet Bruce's worshiped butler and mentor...

“Pleased to meet you, sir. Gotham's sheriff, if I'm not mistaken.” Alfred kept on small talking, totally unfazed, as if the situation was common place.   
Jim blushed some more, if that was possible, and nodded.

“Master Bruce should be doing the formal introductions,” Alfred nodded back, while helping Jim to steady himself in the seated position. If he'd noticed that the sheet hadn't followed the sheriff while he managed to put his feet and legs past the border of the bed, the old man didn't give a clue about it.   
“I guess it will be a while before he will join us in any form of coherent conversation.”

“I hear you,” Bruce mumbled, mouth still full of cotton and sandpaper. If he wanted to sound sour and pissed off, he failed miserably. Even Jim couldn't help but smile at the petulant tone.

“Rejoice world. He's alive,” Alfred commented, irony voluntarily ill concealed. Then he turned his attention back to Jim.   
He took the concoction from the bedside table and handed it to the sheriff, who looked at it skeptically.

“Now, sir, there are just two ways to drink the 'JEEVES:' in a one fell swoop or a sip at a time. I'm sorry to acknowledge that both ways are somewhat conceived to convince the user that drinking too much alcohol bears serious consequences, but the final effect is largely recognized as portentous.”

Jim smiled at Alfred's kindness, reached to take the big glass from him, and noticed for the first time he was totally exposed and showing off everything. He prayed for the floor to open up and swallow him whole, but besides his ears turning so red and hot enough to roast marsh mellows on them, nothing else happened.   
He inhaled sharply, made a first abortive movement with his left hand, then grabbed the sheet with his right. He pulled it higher, holding it securely with white-knuckled fingers. Unfortunately that totally bared Bruce, who protested with a low growl and responded by making a mad grab for the sheet.   
A fruitless battle for the sheet ensued, which belittled the purpose of concealing dangling bits from the view of the old butler, who to his credit, faked his total lack of interest with absolute perfection.

In the end, Jim decided to leave the sheet to Bruce and resolved to cover his lap with a pillow, but by then he was sure that the position of all his birthmarks, even the more concealed ones, were publicly known.   
He buried his shame behind the glass that Alfred had kept on offering, and after the first gulp of it, he forgot everything but the awful, scorching sip of molten lava that went down his throat.

“What the hell is this: juice of rotten corpses?” he asked, looking at the offending object in his hand with a scowl of pure disgust. Then he realized that his mind was feeling already a bit clearer, and with resignation, he gulped another sip and then another.  
Alfred left the sheriff to deal with his first meeting with the 'Jeeves' and went to take care of Bruce, who pouted at him like a sulky child.

“Took you long enough, old man,” he protested, taking the jug from Alfred's hand and drinking it with a passion counterpointed by grimaces of pure disgust.

“Haven't I taught you anything, young man?” Alfred smiled benevolently. “Guests always come first.”

“Yeah. Right. Whatever,” Bruce pouted some more, before taking another big gulp of the 'JEEVES.'

Alfred watched over the proceedings with a mother hen's attention, while he busied himself by sorting out discarded clothes from the floor and the other plain surfaces of the room.  
He had everything folded neatly by the time both men put down the jugs and looked at him sheepishly.   
Jim blushed once again when he received his clothes, boxers, and undershirt on top of the pile from Alfred.

“Believe it or not,” he said contritely, “this is not how I imagined to meet you for the first time, Mr. Pennyworth.”

Bruce snickered, gaining a half reproachful, half amused glance from Alfred.

“Admittedly, as far as first meetings go, this is undoubtedly quite unusual, but it's neither the most original, nor the most shocking, sir. And it's Alfred. Mr. Pennyworth was my late father.” Alfred smiled at Jim reassuringly.

“Actually it wasn't.” Bruce jumped in. “You changed your name when you come to the States, remember?”

“Are you always such a smart ass in the morning?” Jim intervened, grabbing another pillow and launching it playfully in Bruce's face. Bruce threw it back, grinning.

“Look at the bright side, Jim. You can be sure you made a full disclosing first impression.”

“Shut up, brat.”

“And so it begins,” Alfred thought, looking with avuncular affection to the good-natured bantering between the two men and nodding knowingly.

Jim sighed softly, his eyes flickering shut for an instant to allow him to regroup his thoughts. “I better move,” he said as if a part of him wasn't keen to leave just yet. “I've got to go check on Jimmy before starting my turn.”

Testing gingerly his feet on the floor and feeling relieved by the fact they were perfectly functional, he managed to take his clothes in one hand and hold the pillow solidly in front of him, even if it seemed just a pointless exercise in modesty, since everyone in the room had seen everything already.

“May I?” he asked, nodding in the general direction of Bruce's bathroom.

“By all means, be my guest,” Bruce answered, smiling. “If there's something not lacking in this place, it's the bathrooms... I guess grandpa Kane had a weak bladder or something.”

Both laughed and Jim walked in the bathroom, closing the door behind him.  
Alfred kept moving his eyes back and forth from Jim's retreating figure to Bruce's very concentrated expression. For a moment, he had the clear impression that Bruce was jealous of him sneaking a peek at the sheriff's hides.   
The glance Bruce gave him seemed to convey a clear, “back off, old man... he's mine...” before the young man caught himself and managed to put on a more dispassionate expression.   
Alfred payed him back with the same coin, looking pointedly at him until Bruce felt he couldn't bear it any longer.

“What?” he asked grumpily, while he tried to busy himself by putting on his clothes.

“He's a fine catch, Bruce.” Alfred answered, with his usual unflappability.

“I don't know what you're talking about, Alfred.”

Bruce knew exactly what the matter was, but he wasn't going to give anything away, or make things any easier. The situation was already embarrassing enough, and he didn't want to go digging deeply and discover answers to questions such as, “Am I really considering walking in that bathroom right now?”

“The sheriff. He's a very fine looking man.”

Bruce smiled, partly to grant the point and partly in attempt to simulate nonchalance. “Stress on the word man. In case you haven't noticed...”

“In virtue of the last minutes, I'm more than keen to concede the indisputable reality of the sheriff's gender, young man. But I fail to get your point.   
Obviously he's a good '180 degrees' change from Selina Kyle, but he seems a very charming, good natured, handsome, in his own shy kind of way, man. You could have done a lot worse.”

Bruce's eyes went as big as saucers. “Are you implying that Jim and I?”

Alfred didn't move a muscle and that was enough of an answer for Bruce.

“I think you can wait before embroidering his monogram on the pillowcase and towels,” he laughed nervously. “We're both straight.”

“If you say so...” Alfred answered with his patented Mona Lisa's smile.

“Come on, Alfred. We were just drunk. I'm sure nothing happened.”

“Allow me to say: 'Not for lack of trying', Bruce.” Alfred's smile increased another tad. “You were both quite vociferous last night.”

“Oh boy... You heard...”

“Couldn't help it. I'm blessed with a very good hearing, and you were both pretty loud...”

“Did the kids hear too?” Bruce asked concerned.

“I doubt it. Timothy was so beaten that he fell deeply asleep the moment his head hit the pillow, and Richard was listening to his music with the headphones, as usual. And in any case, I don't see where the problem would be. The boys are open minded enough to understand the facts of life.”

“You think?”

“Well... they took it rather well when they learned about me and Lucius.”

“What?” Bruce's jaw fell some inches down. “You and Lucius?”

“You didn't know?” Alfred looked really surprised.

“Of course not. You and Lucius?”

“We've been there already.”

“But you're both straight...”

“And your point is?” Alfred was having the time of his life. He was sure that the conversation was having on Bruce a more sobering effect than the 'Jeeves.'  
“You don't decide with whom you fall in love with, Bruce. It simply happens. You can be lucky enough to recognize it soon and act on it, or you can hide behind the 'manly friendship' and lose decades beating around the bush as Lucius and I did.”

“You and Lucius...” Bruce said again, this time affirming it instead of doubting it. His smile turned goofy. “You and Lucius...” His mind silently completed the thought. “Jim and I?”

He let the thought run free for a while. He weighted it, let it resound like an echo until it lost the questioning tone and started to sound simply right.  
Alfred saw every phase of the process pass on Bruce's face, saw the lines redesign themselves as if made of mercury: first sullen, then meditative and finally relaxed and serene. Alfred took notice of every little nuance and stashed them away for future reference.   
He smiled fondly at Bruce and mentally told himself: “Congratulations old coot. It looks like you're about to gain a son in law,” then aloud he said to Bruce: “Should I start embroidering monograms on pillowcases?”

Bruce laughed aloud, unrestrained, and undoubtedly happy.

“I'm going to make some coffee.” Alfred concluded and started to move toward the door. Then with a second thought he turned on his heels and knocked on the bathroom's door.

“Master Gordon,” he said aloud, so as to be heard from behind the door. “Do you have a middle name?”

“Yes... Worthington... Why?” answered Jim.

“Nothing. Just curious...” Alfred winked conspiratorially at Bruce, who kept on laughing, and mimicked the act of needle-working.

Minutes later Jim joined Alfred and Bruce in the kitchen. Without asking, he took Bruce's blackberry in his hand and copied the number on his cell phone, then he launched a call to transfer his own number on Bruce's cell.   
He thanked Alfred for the miraculous 'Jeeves,' sipped the coffee that the old man put in his hand while he was already walking out the door, and waited a moment, feeling the need to embrace Bruce again before leaving. He restrained himself and instead invented the excuse to call later to see if Tim felt like spending the day with Jimmy.  
Bruce agreed about the plan and let Jim go out.  
Alfred walked behind his protégé and kicked him in the ankle.  
When Bruce turned to look at him with an surprised expression on his face, Alfred produced that slight half smile of his that everybody recognized as his personal interpretation of a grin and commented seraphically.

“I thought you were waiting for a sign to go after him and wish him a proper 'good day.' Since I'm running out of bolts of lightning right now, you'll have to do with a good old kick. Now go, or the next will be in your ass.”

Bruce followed Alfred's advise and went after Jim. He found the sheriff still undecided about going to sit in his car or turning back and getting that hug he had stupidly refused to ask for.  
They stood in front of each other, smiling like love struck teenagers.

“There's something I want to tell you before you go,” Bruce said, stepping some inches closer to Jim.

“I'm listening.”

“I've been drunk several times, but that didn't make me kiss a man before. I'm not sure our making out was because of the booze.”

“There's a way to know for sure,” Jim answered, nodding. “We should try again when sober and see if it still works so good.”

“I'm game if you are.”

Jim extended his hand and grabbed Bruce's. Their fingers interlaced as if it was simply the most natural occurrence in the world.

“There's something running between us,” Jim admitted. Bruce nodded.

“I don't know what it is,” Jim continued. “It's all new and confusing to me, but I know I woke up naked next to you, and I didn't panic. Not even once. I thought it was the hangover, but I feel pretty sober right now, and still no panic.”

“You feel pretty sober, right now?” Bruce asked, grinning mischievously.

“Yeah. Quite so. You?”

“As sober as they come.” Bruce let his eyes wander up and down Jim's body, not bothering to disguise his obvious appreciation. His heart was hammering so hard in his chest that he was sure Jim could hear it.   
He licked his dry lips. "Damn. You're hot."

Jim didn't even try to hide his own longing as he appraised Bruce from head to toe. "So are you," he croaked as he shortened the gap between them.   
Suddenly they were all over each other, grabbing handfuls of flesh through fabric, lips crashing together, mouths opening, tongues daring to explore.   
They kissed deeply, hungrily. They poured their souls into that kiss until their heads swam.   
As the last vestiges of sanity floated away, they took ownership of each other's ass, pulled in tight, and started grinding their hips together.   
Liquid fire spread in their groins and they both thought they were going to come in their pants there and then if they kept on consuming each other like that.   
Forcing themselves to part was the most difficult thing they'd ever done.   
They untangled unwillingly and looked at each other longingly.

“It wasn't the booze,” Bruce breathed out, dumbfounded. It took him a while to get his brain and mouth to work at the same time.

“Definitively not the booze,” Jim panted loudly, then wiped his fogged-up glasses on his shirt. He drew Bruce closer and gently kissed his mouth again. This time when Bruce responded, the kisses were more tender, less animal.

"You know," Bruce said when they separated and settled into a warm embrace, "I could get used to this.”

“Me too,” Jim smiled. “And still no panic.”

“Are you sure?”

“Pretty much. You?”

“Ditto.”

“Good,” Jim's smile turned predatory. “Are you still game about testing the boundaries of this?”

“Yeah.”

“Let me catch this murderer, and then we'll see where this does lead us.”

Bruce nodded and smiled smugly. “I think I know where this will lead us, and it looks promising. So, go catch your murdered...” He pushed Jim into the car and closed the door.

They decided to meet at the 'Breakfast' for lunch, possibly with Tim and Jimmy, and finally Jim drove away. Bruce kept on looking at the car till it disappeared, and then remained still, mulling around all the events of that morning. He searched for some sign of rejection, but nothing came.   
Half an hour later, when the kids woke up, everything still sounded perfectly right.


	19. Chapter 19

As Jim opened the door to his car and stepped out of it to go into Barbara's home, he couldn’t help but think that he was walking a fine line between reality and fantasy.  
He didn’t know if he had just been dreaming it all along or if it was real, but of a thing he was a hundred percent sure: he had never felt so mentally and physically at ease with himself as he was now.

He didn’t know what to make of the elation, of the pins and needles running through his nerves, of the sudden boost of energy, and of the goofy, silly smiles that kept surfacing on his face at random intervals. He still felt a little drunk, even if Alfred's potion had killed the effect of the booze with miraculous speed. He also felt younger, handsomer, and changed in ways he didn't believe possible at his age.

It had fallen unto him like an epiphany, while looking in the mirror of Bruce's bathroom. The man looking back at him still looked a bit flushed for having mooned an old butler, but besides that he looked smugly confident, impossibly calm, and positively happy.   
That man, so impossibly dashing and full of life, had looked back at him without squeezing his eyes, even if the glasses were still on Bruce's bedside table, and had smiled and nodded approvingly.

In that moment, the absurdity of the whole situation had hit him straight in the face. Until a few short hours ago, he had been a totally straight man. He had never touched another man's genitals nor had any other man ever touched his if not for medical reasons. Now he was seriously contemplating the idea of going back in Bruce's room, asking Alfred to leave them alone, and seeing if lying in bed with another man, kissing him, caressing him, stroking him, and babbling goofy terms of endearment felt the same without the alcohol. He had the feeling it could be even better, and the man that had looked back at him from the mirror seemed to be sure of it if the smug grin on his face was something to go on.

"I need you to explain all this to me," he had begged to his reflection. “Why am I so happy, instead of racked with guilt?"

"I can't,” the man in the mirror had answered. “ Nobody can explain why two people fall in love. It just happens. Can't you just accept it without looking a gift horse in the mouth?"

"Love?" Jim looked at his reflection, stunned. "Come on. We met just two days ago.”  
He had wanted to add “and he's man...” but he'd known, right that moment, that he was already past that hurdle and couldn't care less. The next step, admitting that he was really in love with Bruce Wayne, had come as easily, and with it came the hope that the younger man could feel the same because he had no idea where to start to court a man, but he'd felt sure he was going to try his hardest to succeed.

When Bruce had reached him in the backyard and had told him he was willing to explore what was happening to them, Jim had felt so happy he had barely managed to keep from crying, and the kisses had been even better, probably because they weren't accidental anymore.  
Jim could swear he was already missing those kisses. He could still feel the heat of their intertwined bodies, and he felt blood pooling in his groin just thinking about it. He shook his head in disbelief at what was running through his mind.  
He thought back to when he first laid his eyes on the young ex billionaire and realized that he’d probably fallen for him then and there and that he'd never felt anything so strong before.   
Well, that was incorrect. He'd fallen in love with Barbara a long time ago, but there was no way to compare the experiences. He'd gone through a lot of trial and error before Barbara, so he had a pretty clear idea about what to do and what not to do around her, but with Bruce it was all brand new and uncharted, and it was more scaring, and more exciting because of it.

He wondered if Bruce was missing him too. That would be nice. He resisted the urge to call him already. That felt too 'lovestruck teenager' and calling just after half an hour was really out of character for him. He could wait another hour, give or take sixty minutes, before the urge of listening to Bruce's voice again become compelling. He smiled at himself and he muttered almost inaudibly:

“You've got it bad, old man.”

“Good morning, Dad.”

Jim came back from his flight of fancy with a start and looked around as if trying to remember where he was and why.

“Good morning,” he answered back, trying to imagine why his daughter was up so soon, already dressed for school, and with a pile of books under her arm. Hadn't she just been suspended the day before?   
Babs walked jovially to him and kissed him on the cheek. Jim kissed her back.

“Where are you going so soon?” he asked, taking stock of her 'perfect student's' look.

“I'm going to ambush the principal before he reaches the schoolyard and see if I can trade the suspension for something less dreadful, such as some Saturdays at school or some extra curricular work. Failing that, I'm going to spend the whole morning in the school library, looking contrite, repentant and totally absorbed by the research I have to present next week, which by the way is done already, but that's beside the point. Whoever looks at me there will have to feel guilty for keeping such a paragon of virtue away from her studies.”

“Sounds like a plan, but I thought you agreed to let your mom play bad cop today.”

“That's my plan B and one of the cards I plan to play against the principal. I'll let you know if it works.” She kissed him again and started to walk away, then stopped, turned on her heels and looked strangely at him for a moment.

“You look different this morning, Dad.” She smiled broadly at him.

“Different how?” he couldn't help but ask, feeling a little anxiety.

“I don't know. Different, but in a good way... You seem...” she inclined her head first to one side and then to the other as if trying to catch more details from her father's posture and body language. She scrutinized him deeply and finally nodded satisfied. “Yeah. You seem happy. It looks good on you, Dad.”

After that Babs left, and Jim walked to the house. He tried the main door and found it still closed, so he picked out his own key to open it and, without further ado, walked straight to Jimmy's room. Silently, he slipped into the room, eased himself down on the edge of the mattress, and reached out to brush a strand of hair from his son’s cheek. Jimmy mumbled a protest in his sleep, rubbed at his nose, and turned onto his side, which clashed with his injured ribs and forced him to open his eyes.

“Hey, champ,” Jim whispered, smiling softly. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”

Jimmy looked up at him through the sleep in his eyes. “What time is it?” he asked, sitting up and slipping gingerly into his embrace.

“Early,” Jim murmured, rubbing a hand over his hair. “How do you feel?”

“Beaten...” Jimmy answered groggily. He made a pained face and propped himself back against a mountain of pillows.

“I’m sorry, Daddy,” he murmured, nipping at his lower lip.

“For what?”

“For being such a wuss. I should have decked Todd.”

“You're not a wuss, and nothing of what happened yesterday is your fault.” Jim saw Jimmy's sadness and felt bad and angry with Jason Todd even more. He tried to conceal his state of mind to keep from giving Jimmy the wrong impression. He made a face and mussed Jimmy's hair once again, trying to reassure him.

“Dick took them all down all alone...” Jimmy continued, still looking down as if ashamed.

“Dick Grayson's older and bigger than you and Tim, and he took down the whole wrestling team when he arrived in town. You can't compare to him... Hell, I probably can't compare to him either.”

That seemed to restore Jimmy's spirit. “May I try for the wrestling team?” he asked, and Jim realized that probably that was where the kid wanted to go from the start. He smiled and wondered if he'd lost his bat suit in favor of Dick in his son's mind. He decided he could live with it. At least for a while.

“You're a couple of years too young for the wrestling team,” Jim said and saw Jimmy's expression turn subdued once again. “But once you've healed, we can see if there's some opening in the next martial arts class.”

“Can we ask Tim to come too?” Jimmy's smile lit the whole room.

“I don't see why not. I'm sure Bruce will have nothing to object.” Just naming Bruce made him feel lightheaded, but he let it pass.

His son's good humor restored, Jim moved to the next task and carried Jimmy to the bathroom where he oversaw the whole process of his son's morning routine, trying to be as unobtrusive as possible.   
Jimmy tried with all his might to work around his injuries without requesting his father's help, but in some cases he couldn't avoid it. There was no way to make some movements with his ribs hurting that much. In the end, he put aside his pride and asked his dad for help. That got him washed, combed, freshly dressed, but also so tired that he had to go back to bed.   
All Jim had to do to convince him to take some more rest was to promise him that he could call Tim when he woke up later in the morning, and if both felt up to it, they could arrange to spend the afternoon together.   
He was pretty sure that both kids would wind up postponing the meeting for a day or two, but there was no real telling when it came to them.

Jim switched off the lights again and left his son to some more hours of sleep after a last quick kiss on Jimmy's forehead, for once not marred by the usual protest about being to old for that, and walked away.

He found Barbara waiting for him in the kitchen, looking too damn good in her white, almost see through, nightshirt and black and blood red colored silk kimono. She also looked like General Custer should have at Little Big Horn just before the Indians' final attack.

They looked at each other for a very long while, without saying a word. The silence kept on and on for what seemed like hours, even if they were probably just seconds. Barbara stood still for a long moment, just looking at him, her expression stony. Jim noticed she was tense and on the defensive. She was probably waiting to see how he was going to act before choosing her line of action.

“I'm not mad at you, Barbara,” he conceded. His mouth curled up a little, twitching his mustache at the corners. That finally broke the tension a bit. Slowly Barbara smiled back at him and moved to the side to let him take his usual place at the kitchen's table.

“Coffee?” she offered, tentatively.

“No, thanks. Had one already,” Jim said, trying to look calm, even if the drumming of his fingers on the table gave his sudden nervousness away . Barbara filled her mug. Then she went to sit at the table next to him.

“I tried to call you, yesterday evening,” she admitted.

“I know.”

“Even at home.”

“Didn't sleep at home...” Jim said and tried very hard to suppress the beginning of a smile that came with the memory of the place he slept and the man he slept with. His mustache gave him away nonetheless, but Barbara didn't make the connection.

“What are you going to do?” she asked, trying, without really managing, to conceal her concerns. Jim didn't need to ask her what she was talking about. It was all as clear as a blue sky. He resented her a little for being so concerned with herself that she managed to miss his unusual good humor that, by the way, was starting to decrease already.

“I'm not going to report you, but you have to find a solution. You can't sleep with the judge who tries your cases.”

“Do you really think that my relationship with Dent would compromise the way I work?” Barbara's stoic expression cracked a bit at the seams. Color rose into her face as she automatically glanced around as if to search for something to give her reassurance in a moment of confusion.  
Jim drew a quick breath in a manner that suggested his shirt was a little too tight in the chest at Barbara's admission. A part of his mind was still fighting against yesterday's discovery.

“It doesn't matter what I think, Barbara. Every lawyer who comes to know of this would have material for an appeal and a good chance to win it. So far nothing you two have tried was so big to deserve that kind of attention, but we have a homicide on our hands right now. Soon there will be a trial...”

“I want to try this case, Jim.” Barbara confessed. She didn't add all the usual corollaries about the boost of her career she'd seemed to be expecting since forever. Jim was grateful for that. He didn't need to hear the same old refrain again.

“I know.”

“Can't you help me?”

“Doing what? Keeping silent on your fling with judge Dent? Aren't you asking a bit too much of me?” A whoop of laughter burst out of Jim when the realization fell on him. He tried to contain it but failed. “So this is why...” he mumbled, trying to regain a bit of control.

“Why what?”

“Why you took me to your bed again. I thought I was just your official cover, but there's more than that. My God, Barbara, will you ever stop to try to manipulate everyone around you?”

Barbara held herself rigid, fists clenching at her sides. “I’m not sure I like the opinion you have of me right now,” she said tightly.

“I don't care. For the first time in a very long while, I really don't care. When you're not Gotham's Queen Bee, you're the most lovable woman I've ever known, but you're the Queen Bee almost 24/7 now, so it's hard to understand if people like Harvey and me are human beings to you or just drones to be used by you and then thrown away.”

“Is that all?” she asked, rage shuddering just beneath the surface of her voice.

“No. I also want to thank you,” he commented, feeling relieved and showing it.

“Thank me for what?” she asked, confused by Jim's levity.

“For setting me free,” he said and he meant it. Up to that moment, he hadn't fully realized that his attachment to Barbara was broken, and he really was free to go look for something better.

“Up to yesterday our divorce was just two signatures on a piece of paper.” He arched a brow lazily. “Damn. We celebrated it sleeping together... And I've been at your beck and call ever since.” He stopped a moment to ponder his next phrase and then continued, “In my mind, I guess we never stopped being married, we just changed our arrangements. How stupid of me, don't you think?”

Barbara's color went paler, and her brows pulled a little lower over her eyes. “I don't think you're stupid. And I didn't want to hurt you. You have to believe me.”

“I do, sweetheart. You didn't do anything to me that I didn't allow you to do. The point is, it's over. I really hope we can still remain friends, but I'm willing to give that up too if the price is to keep being manipulated by you, Barbara. I also hope that you're so in love with Dent to ignore the fact he's married.” He worked on the knot of his necktie that felt like it was strangling him. “That would make your attempt to use me once again still unacceptable, but at least more understandable than just being part of one of your schemes to climb the social ladder.”

“This thing with Harvey...” Barbara whispered contritely, “I didn't plan it. It just happened.”

“I know what you mean, dear.” Jim nodded, and his mind went once again back to Bruce. Another smile curved the edges of his mustache, and this time Barbara noticed.

“You're seeing someone...” She stated, sure but surprised.

Jim nodded automatically, almost not realizing it. Barbara looked at him curiously, inclining her head first to a side and then to the other just as Babs had done.  
“It wasn't there two days ago.” She tried a shy smile. “Please tell me it's not Renee.”  
Jim looked at Barbara as if she'd grown a second head in those last seconds. “Of course it's not Montoya. She's barely older than our daughter.”

“Then who?” she kept musing aloud. “Mustn't be local. You had all the time to do local and always refused. So it must be someone from outside.”

Jim didn't give any clue, he just remained there, watching his ex trying to call him out. He felt almost compelled to tell her, but desisted. He couldn't overcome the feeling that she would try to use the information to her advantage.

“One of Stephens' tech girls?” Barbara kept on. “ Maybe one of those journalists who came here ... I hope it's not that Vale woman you fought with yesterday.”

Jim laughed aloud. “It's not Vicky Vale...” He stepped up, patted Barbara on the shoulder and started to move.   
“I have a murderer to catch,” he said, “and you have a lot to think about too. I'll give you time to patch things up at your leisure, but the moment I see it interfere with our investigations or the trial, I'm going to expose you and Harvey to the Governor and let the State fix it for you. I can't do anything else...”

“I know.” Barbara nodded. “It's more than I deserve. Thank you.”

“You're welcome.”

Jim left a moment later, just after a last check on Jimmy, who was still sleeping peacefully.   
Barbara waited to see the patrol car leaving the driveway before taking out her cell and dialing quickly.

“Jim's been here,” she said just after the voice on the other side managed to say Hi. “You were right about everything. We need to talk...”


	20. Chapter 20

From the car's speakers Martin Gore started singing:

“I want somebody to share  
Share the rest of my life  
Share my innermost thoughts  
Know my intimate details”

Bruce snorted and looked askance at Alfred, arching his eyebrow in a mute question that the old man answered shaking his head vigorously, as if to say:   
“What do you want from me, Kiddo. I don't control the airwaves.”  
Bruce's eyebrow seemed to convey his incredulity in the statement, and Alfred's mouth curled a micron of an inch under his thin mustache, and then he winked imperceptibly.

“You should take that number to the circus,” commented Tim sardonically, studying them from the back seat. “The men who talk with their eyebrows.”

“Alfred. He's alive,” Bruce exclaimed, feigning utter surprise. “The Boy Who Brooded has come back to us. Rejoice world.”   
The youngest,and most dented, member of the Wayne's brigade had been in full brooding mood since Bruce hadn't allowed him to go to town with Dick on the Tumbler. He was very sanguine about keeping up the scowl even if the effects of the road bumps on his aching limbs were slowly, but powerfully, making him realize that Bruce's choice had been right all along.

“Looks who's talking,” Tim retorted, giving in to a small smile and the first signs of his coming out from his foul mood. “The man who elevated brooding to an art form.”

“Touchè,” Bruce admitted.

“Which reminds me, I wanted to ask you something since I woke up: Are you on drugs?”

“Nope. Why?”

“You're in good mood for the first time in weeks... And you're sparkling more than a 'Twilight' vampire.”

“Do vampires sparkle in 'Twilight'?” Bruce had to ask.

Tim didn't bother to answer the question and only shook his head disconsolately as if to underline the cross generational gap. Not that he cared about that movie or book in the least, but he and Jimmy had caught glimpses of it while making a point to disturb Babs and her friends during their viewing of the DVD, and that made him an expert on the matter compared to Bruce.

“Maybe you should explain to young Timothy why you are in such a good mood this morning,” Alfred added, without averting his eyes from the road. All he gave away of the fun he was having was just another almost invisible curl of his pencil tin mustache.  
Bruce couldn't help but look at the old ex butler in total bewilderment. His eyes conveyed plainly his unwillingness to discuss his excursions into wild homosexual hard petting. Not with a preteen boy anyway.   
Alfred took pity of Bruce's embarrassment and fixed his own little mishap.

“Bruce and I are starting a new company here in Gotham, Timothy.”

“Are you serious?” Tim asked, suddenly unsure he'd heard it right.

“About what?” Bruce asked.

“We're going to stay here?” Tim inquired. He and Dick had almost dragged him out of the city and sort of coerced him to stay in Gotham. If this was true, it was the first time Bruce was giving signs he wanted to stay on his own volition. It was too good to be true.

“Yes, Tim. Alfred and I talked yesterday evening, and we came to the conclusion we can try to start some activity here in town.”

“You're going to stay too, Alfie?” Tim was truly beaming by now.

“For a while at least, Timothy. There is a lot of work to do to start a new business.”

“Wow. We're going to be rich again.” Tim commented, proudly.

“Hold your horses, cowboy,” Bruce rebutted good naturedly, but with increasing enthusiasm. “We still haven't fixed the details or studied what kind of business is most suitable to succeed in a town like Gotham. Not to mention that we haven't even started to look for a place to set up shop here. We can't do it from the farm. The smell of manure is terribly distracting.”

Alfred nodded approvingly, silently thanking Mr. Gordon for the already positive effect he was having on his charge. By all means and measures, Bruce seemed a different man already. Alfred hadn't seen that light in the younger man's eyes since the first days of his acquittance with Miss Kyle, and at the time, the result of such enthusiasm had produced one of the most prosper moments for the Wayne enterprise, not to mention the coming of Dick into their lives.  
Tim didn't know who he had to thank yet, but he didn't bother to dissimulate his happiness at the news.

“Where do we start looking?” the young, no more brooding boy, asked, feeling already part of the plan.

“I'd say we start from the town center and move toward the outskirts. That should keep us busy for at least ten minutes. Fifteen if we look very attentively and walk very slowly,” Bruce joked. “But first we have to get you to Doctor Nowlan, and we have to meet the principal about Dick's suspension.”

“Alfred can drive me to the doctor,” Tim replied emphatically, probably afraid that Bruce could change his mind again. “And he can speak to the Principal too.”

“No, he can't. I'm legally in charge of you both. I can't delegate it to Alfred.”

“But we can save some time if you go to retrieve your computer equipment, while I drive young Timothy to the doctor.” Alfred intervened, spotting the return of Tim's scowl from the rearview mirror. As he suspected, the sulk disappeared quickly to be replaced by a new bout of energized pleads about doing just so.

“Ok. Ok... I can't win against you two,” Bruce conceded. “You can leave me at the sheriff's office. We'll meet back at the 'Breakfast' when you're done with Doc Nowlan.”

Two minutes later Bruce was walking alone along main street, Alfred and Tim having decided they could save some more time by dropping him were they were and letting him walk the rest of the way to the sheriff's office.   
Even if he faked some kind of protest, just to keep up appearances, Bruce didn't mind the walk at all.  
There was something different about the town that morning. It was shining bright and cheerfully alive. Cars and trucks were running along Main Street, and people were walking busily on the sidewalks lined by the imitation gaslights, now switched off, planted into flowerbeds in full bloom.   
The early 1880's buildings were all open for business and sporting their best colors. There weren't two walls that looked alike, Bruce noticed for the first time. Each one had its textures and little motifs. Each had tiny little details to show for the almost manic care the people of Gotham reserved for them.   
The glass of the windows, shining in the morning light, made everything look more festive as if the spit-and-polish clean, tidy little town was feeling the enthusiasm for the incoming Birthday festival.   
As he passed the building of the Gotham Gazette, Bruce couldn't help but admit to himself that he liked it and the courthouse next to it with its Clock tower in the center that called to mind that old movie.  
Bruce smiled when his eyes spotted the parking slot with the 'SHERIFF GORDON' sign painted in yellow on both the pavement and the wall in front of it.   
He couldn't help but wonder if the true reason he was suddenly so charmed by the be same little town, which he had barely noticed for more than a month, had a mustache, thick horn rimmed glasses, and looked positively dashing in a sheriff's uniform.

His walk to the courthouse was sidetracked by the presence of the Tumbler parked in front of the 'Breakfast'. He turned to check on Dick, imagining him inside the diner, probably waiting for them to arrive, in order to go have a talk with the Principal, and he saw it: the big green manifest heavily duct taped onto the window glass of the office above the 'Breakfast;' the one with the name 'Bart Carver' and the title 'accountant' written in bold square letters.  
The manifest simply stated: “ For Rent. Info 912...” in black ink on green paper.

“Talk about serendipity,” Bruce muttered, unable to conceal his astonishment.  
The idea of getting an office in the town's center had bumped into his mind out of nowhere, probably driven out by the thought that the same mustached, bespectacled, good looking in uniform guy who had suddenly made him appreciate the town, was easier to meet there than anywhere else in the county.   
Finding the possible answer to his extemporaneous and out of the blue desire right in front of him, and across the street from the entrance of Jim's office, looked so incredible it smelled almost suspicious.   
Suspicious or not, Bruce took out his blackberry and saved the number in the address book.

“If this is not a sign, I don't know what it is,” he muttered to himself, while he walked toward the entrance of the 'Breakfast.'

Being way past 9 o'clock the 'Breakfast' was almost empty. A young girl that Bruce still didn't know was tidying up the tables. Maria and the cook were talking about preparing things for lunch and commenting on the good, as usual, takings of the morning run and a old, grandfatherly looking, heavily bespectacled, and a bit portly man with a garish necktie over a short sleeved shirt was perusing the morning paper and nodding at the headlines.  
Bruce nodded politely at the other customer and turned his attention to Maria, who was saying something about stuffing the morning incomes down Mr. Cobblepot's throat.   
Even if he shared more or less the same sentiment about the banker, Bruce didn't comment and waited for her to stop her rant before asking if she'd seen Dick.

“He was here,” Maria answered, producing one of her most charming smiles. Bruce wondered if those smiles were as much a reason for the success of the diner as the food itself. Harvey Bullock was a very gruff, grumpy, and lucky son of a bitch.  
She turned toward the waitress and asked: “Stephanie, do you know where Dick's gone?”

“He met Barbie Gordon outside and walked away with her,” the blond young girl answered and then added: “They're so cute together.”

“Yeah. Barbie wanted to get her suspension reduced, and Dick thought it wasn't such a bad idea and went with her,” added the cook, smiling conspiratorially.   
That left Bruce open mouthed in astonished surprise. He was pretty much sure that nothing and nobody could get Dick interested in doing something like that.

 

“Really?” he had to ask, still incredulous. “We're all sure we're talking about the same Dick Grayson, right? Tall, dark haired, perpetually detached and apathetic?”

“Didn't look too apathetic to me,” commented Stephanie and the cook at the same time. “ He offered to carry Barbie's books.”

“Oh boy,” Bruce couldn't help but smile. “There must be something very good in the air here around.”   
He knew what the 'something' was: the Gordons. Undoubtedly there was something magical about that family. The fact that he felt lightheaded and energized just thinking about the oldest member of said family sounded like an incontrovertible   
proof of the fact.  
That brought back to his mind the 'for rent' panel. He wasn't sure why he felt that way, but he seemed to know that the office upstairs was going to play a major role in the growing of his relation to the town and to its man of the law.

“What can you tell me about the office upstairs?” he asked, while Maria pushed a mug in his direction and filled it to the brim with coffee.

“The BAT CAVE?” she inquired, her smile lightning up the whole place. Even the old man in the corner raised his head from the newspaper and looked at Bruce hopefully.

“BAT CAVE?” Bruce eyebrows took a dive toward the bridge of his nose, trying to imagine what kind of devastation or infestation could have originated such a nick name.

“Well. There was a time when there was BART CARVER written on the door, but a series of strange contingencies which I suspect, but can't prove, are probably two eight year-old twins (mine), who made all the Rs disappear. So now BAT CAVE it is. Even Bart calls it so,” she laughed and pointed at the old man, who smiled and nodded. Then the old man, obviously Bart Carver, walked toward Bruce extending his hand.  
“Bart Carver,” he introduced himself shaking Bruce's hand vigorously. “Do you want to rent the office?”

“I'm thinking about it.” Bruce nodded and saw both Mr. Carver and Maria's smiles turn into full fledged grins.

“Oh God. That's wonderful.” Maria commented, her excitement increasing exponentially. Bart Carver seemed a bit more restrained in showing enthusiasm, and inquired: “May I ask you why?”

“My associate and I are going to establish our company here in town.”

“Field of action?” asked Mr. Carver.

“Financial brokerage on my part, real estate for my associate. He trusts solid things more than volatile stocks, especially with this economy.”

The answer seemed to please Mr. Carver, who nodded convincingly at Maria. They looked at each other conspiratorially, and Maria couldn't refrain from saying: “We should continue this conversation somewhere else.”

“What about the office?” proposed Carver and Maria nodded. Bruce looked at them and wondered about the sudden need for privacy.

“There's something I should know?” he asked not hiding his increasing perplexity.

“Not here.” Both Maria and Bart Carver said at the same time. “Come with us.”

Bruce told the cook to tell an old English man and a patched up kid to wait for him when they arrived, but he restrained to add that if he wasn't back in an hour, the same old English man should call for help, but only because he wasn't sure he could trust the cook to deliver the message.  
He followed the two conspirators out of the 'breakfast and toward the oak door in the east side of the building.  
Carver led the way, and he opened the door with 'BAT CAVE' stenciled on the opaque glass panel.   
The anteroom looked sober and well kept. There was a desk with a bank of phones and a computer terminal, a couple of armchairs in front of the desk, and several chairs lined the opposite wall. On the third wall, between two windows, there was a a display cabinet with a baseball uniform, striped in yellow and green and with “Gotham Robins” written on the chest.

“That was mine,” Bart Carver commented, seeing Bruce's interest for the strange display. “I used to play in High school, and I hit the home run which took us to the finals.” There was pride and a bit of melancholy in the old man voice. “I should have taken it away when I closed the office... I still can...”  
From the old man's voice, Bruce imagined that there was an unsaid part to that statement, and it probably sounded like, “But I'd prefer not to.”   
He also imagined that the reason would be told to him soon enough, so he decided to skip ahead and give the first concession.

“I wouldn't mind keeping it there if I decide we need a waiting room. It gives character to the place,” he said and saw Carver's expression change from guarded to openly loving.

They moved into the proper office, and Bruce's eyebrows tried to escape beyond his hairline. It wasn't the giant penny hanging behind the main desk or the hyper technological horse shoe shaped desk, with its banks of computers (one of them probably a server) and a wall of monitors to the side which made him grow goose bumps on his arms. Neither was it the armchair that went along nicely with the 'ripped from the N.A.S.A' workstation.   
It was the big, gray-greenish, half painted, half carved giant T-Rex which encompassed two walls, barely skipped a window and had its head coming out in profile from above the door. Its tail was coiled around a couch that was apparently made of rocks and stuffed to look like a river of lava was pouring out of them.

“Oh. My. God!”Bruce found himself exclaiming before he could catch himself.

“I know, it's bit eccentric,” Bart Carver justified himself, sheepishly.

“That's an understatement,” Maria's merriment reached another high note.

“Why?” was all that Bruce managed to say instead.

“I was bored,” answered Mr. Carver as matter of fact as if he was commenting the weather. “The safe and bar are hidden inside Dino, and there's a video cam in his eye.” He kept on going as if explaining the most common asset of the office. Then, realizing the true extension of Bruce's shock, he concluded conceding:   
“You can remove it, if you want.”

“I don't know,” Bruce mumbled, keeping on eying the giant reptile with suspicion. He tried to imagine Alfred's face at the sight of such abomination and decided that, just for that, it was worth waiting to declare Dino a not welcomed big lizard. “It grows on you after a while...” he admitted.

They sat all around the horse-shoe shaped desk with Bruce turning his back to the T-Rex, finding it a bit disturbing.  
In order to placate Bruce's reaction to Dino, Bart switched on the work station and smiled smugly at the younger man's awe.

“Nice, isn't it?” he asked, recognizing in the young man a fellow computer geek.  
He started to enunciate all the characteristics of the work station, certain that he had won Mr. Wayne's attention from the get go, and it couldn't be otherwise. There was nothing so up to date in the whole county, and not even the bank system was so high performing.

“I'd be happy to sell it to you, young man,” he concluded after a long, enthusiastic tour of the machine's performances. Carver saw Bruce practically salivating over the thing, and then get suddenly sad like a kid who'd reached the ice cream parlor and discovered he'd lost the coins he had in the pockets.  
“Or I can lease it to you for a little extra monthly, and you'll redeem it when you're ready.”

“Do I get a discount if I keep Dino?” Bruce smiled, tuning his head to give another look at the giant thing behind him.

“Told you he was going to keep it,” Maria nodded to Bart, and the old man laughed aloud.

“I own the whole building,” Carver stated, suddenly turning his voice back to a whisper, “I retired last month and I'm going to go realize my dream as soon as I sell this place.”

“And the dream is?” Bruce asked because he had the feeling that the old man wanted it.

“Buy a Winnebago and drive across the whole U.S.”

Bruce smirked, “Why this doesn't surprise me?”

“Because you're an open minded man from the city, I guess,” Carver nodded. “Here they all think I'm crazy, but what do they know? Most of them haven't been further away than the county limit all their lives.”

“But why the secrecy?”

“It's because of Cobblepot,” Maria jumped in, taking over the conversation from Carver. “Harvey and I have tried to make an offer for this place, but the damn penguin has showed us the door. He said the bank can't be exposed to such a risk, since we already have a mortgage on our house.”

“That man is the most strict, anal retentive paper pusher I've ever met,” Carver added his two cents. “The idiot has exposed the bank a lot with Jack Napier and his useless resort, so now he's overcompensating, penalizing the rest of us.”

“With our incomes, Harvey and I were more than qualified to get a mortgage,” Maria continued, “but he denied it because I'm pregnant, and the 'Breakfast' can't guarantee the same income without me at the helm. As if pregnancy has stopped me eight years ago... and they were twins.”

“Hence the idea to rent the office,” Bart explained. “I rent the office, which should placate Cobblepot's fear about the decrease of the 'Breakfast' income. Maria and Harvey make a second go at buying the building, and I can buy my Winnebago.

“What happens to the leaseholder after the property passes from you to Maria?” Bruce inquired.

“The conditions stay the same,” Maria confirmed. “I guarantee that. We have no plans for the second floor, and renting it was already an option we were considering.”

Bruce stood up and started walking, pondering the deal, while Maria and Bart kept on looking at him, trying to be not blatant in their scrutiny.  
Bruce wanted the office, or rather, he was sure he wanted the work station, but he didn't know what to do with the big dinosaur plastered onto the walls and the volcano couch.  
What clients would take someone seriously with that thing in the office, Bruce wondered. On the other hand, Mr. Carver had had it for a long while and his affairs didn't seem to suffer the slightest consequences. Then again Carver was part of the community. He had hit the home run that brought the local school team to the finals.   
Certainly, life was going to be hard for an outsider like him even without adding the eccentricity of Dino. He could have it removed, that for sure, but in some ways that seemed wrong too.  
Bruce was about to ask for time and talk about the whole thing with Alfred and the kids, when he looked down the main window and saw Jim coming out of the sheriff's office along with Bullock and Stephens from BCI.  
Just a glance at the handsome, lean, and youthful looking man in uniform down below and Bruce's mind was made.

“Let's do it,” he said convinced, turning toward Carver and Maria and willingly ignoring Dino. “Lets talk business.”


	21. Chapter 21

“Cause of death: Massive blood loss. Probable weapon: a thin sharp blade,” Jim read aloud from the report in his hands.

“There’s a surprise,” Stephens drawled sarcastically. He sat with his battered Top-Siders propped on the edge of Jim's desk. He wore a tie because there were still press around, and ties were part of the official attire for BCI field agents. The strip of fabric was too short, and he had a feeling part of his collar was caught under it at the back of his neck.   
He didn’t really care.

“There anything of interest in there, or can I save myself the trouble?” he asked, pointing at the page of the yellow legal pad.

“Nothing you didn’t see for yourself,” Jim said, giving a little growl of disgust as he slid into his chair. He rubbed a hand across his eyes and worked his mouth against the taste of stale coffee.   
While waiting for the first reports to arrive, he'd spent the time doing routine work: reassigning the usual patrolling of the county roads to the part of his officers not involved directly in the Napier case; thus all his senior officers were in the office, twiddling their thumbs while waiting for someone of the BCI to have a need of them, and a bunch of rookies were out there, driving through miles and miles of farm lands without supervision.   
That wouldn't have been a problem any other day of the year, but today was different. There was still a murderer at large in the county.   
To add insult to injury, Jim had actually been looking forward to the moment he could finally interrogate Arnold Flass and start to get some answers, but so far Flass' lawyer had rescheduled twice in the name of some obscure reason he had to check before allowing the interrogation to start.   
Jim knew enough about the law to make sure there was no chance in hell of the lawyer getting him thrown out of the interrogation just because he was a material witness during the Kane's farm incident, but that hadn't kept the slimy lawyer from trying.

“Anything new from your lab boys?” he asked Stephens.

“There was anticoagulant in Napier's blood.” Stephens perked up, pleased to have something more useful to say. “According to his doctor, he’d been having some problems with phlebitis lately.”

“That could solve our problem with time of death.” Jim admitted.

Stephens nodded. “Yeah, it could have been earlier, but it’s hard to say. There was something else,” he added. “Sidenafil.”

Jim frowned. “Meaning?”

“Viagra.”

“Oh... I'm not a doctor, but isn't it dangerous along with anticoagulant?”

“I'm not a doctor either. But it seems a moot point now. If the side effect of the two drugs combined is not a knife's cut along the throat, then I think there's nothing much to gain by digging around,” Stephens said, grinning as he pulled his feet down and leaned forward on his chair. The end of his tie swung across a danish, which he’d left on a pile of statements, and picked up a glob of lemon filling on the tip.

“Au contraire, my dear Watson,” Jim beamed, his blue eyes dancing. “We already knew he was caught with his trousers down, literally. Now we know he popped a blue pill or two, even if that was clashing with the other drugs he was taking, which leads us toward the obvious conclusion...”

“He was with a woman...”

“Bingo. Or a man for that matter. We can't exclude that yet.” Jim paused, marking time with the beat of his fingers. “I'm willing to bet money against straw that we will find DNA on Napier's privates, and since they were still displayed, it seems to me we're getting close to our murderer or to a material witness of the fact.”

“I'll get the boys speeding up the tests on the biological findings. I guess it'd be useless to ask the wife, right?”

“Asking is never useless, but I've got the feeling that my oldest one was still learning to ride her bicycle the last time Mrs. Napier went intimate with Jack.”

“A mistress, then.”

Jim nodded. “Let's start with the one we know of.” He picked up the phone and spoke with his usual confidence. “Harvey? Can you and Rene pay a visit to Miss Quinzel and invite her to join us for a friendly talk? Good. Ah... and remind her that declining the invite is not an option.”  
Stephens smiled at Jim.

“What?” Jim arched a brow inquisitively.

“You're in top form this morning,” Stephens commented. “Did you get some last night?”

Jim ignored Stephens' question and the enthralling image of Bruce Wayne in his birthday's suit that came to mind uninvited. He also decided to ignore the question that bumped in his mind about the possible existence of some sort of manual, a 'Gay Sex for Dummies' maybe, and the consequential admission which stemmed from said question answering the question one about how far he would go with Bruce if chance presented itself.

“I don't think it's Miss Quinzel,” he said instead, bringing back the focus on the matter at hand.

“Why not?”

“Why doing it in a car when you've got a comfortable apartment?”

“The thrill of the outlandish?”

“Could be, which is why I sent for Harley Quinzel, but you'll see for yourself that she's anything but the type...”

Stephens smiled broadly. “In the right circumstances, everybody is the type for everything...”

Jim conceded the point with a nod. After all, the right circumstances had brought him to consider having sex with Bruce Wayne. That made him think again about the 'Gay Sex for Dummies' manual. He hoped there was something of the sort on the Internet to check in the privacy of his own home. He'd die of embarrassment if he was forced to go look for something like that in the county library.

The trill of his phone brought him back to reality with a bit of a start that, luckily, went totally unobserved by Stephens. He picked up, and Agatha announced that judge Harvey Dent was there to see him immediately.   
Jim couldn't help but mutter a heartfelt “Fuck!” before excusing himself with Stephens and telling Agatha to let the judge in.

“Problems?” asked Stephens, moving to leave.

“I don't know yet, but I wouldn't exclude it either,” Jim admitted. Mentally he pondered what could be worse: Dent coming in his role of county judge – which he should not at this stage of the investigation - or as his ex wife's actual lover. Both scenarios looked ominous to say the least.

Harvey Dent and Stephens crossed paths at the door, and the judge didn't give the BCI's officer more than the necessary attention to avoid bumping into him. He entered and stood stiff on the other side of Jim's wooden desk, trying to project his usual patrician aloofness and make it intimidating. He waited expectantly, freshly groomed and clipped, phony hint of a benign smile firmly in place.   
Jim looked at him, and what he saw was the usual image of a goldfish puffing up to look like a big shark inside the fish bowl, with his crisp white shirt, regimental tie neatly knotted, and charcoal three piece suit.   
Despite his best efforts to fit the part he looked still too much like a kid trying to appear grown up by donning his father's clothes, Jim thought, arching a brow.   
When he was young, Jim had known,feared, loved and respected judge Harvey Dent Sr. as anyone else in the county. The man was the real McCoy.   
His son simply didn't have in him the charisma and personality to be a leader, and no tailored suits or studied poses could fill such a lack of attributes.

“Good morning, Judge. What can I do for you?” Jim broke the silence after a while, inviting Harvey to sit with a casual gesture of his hand.  
The judge sat and for a long moment just looked at Jim, his expression stony, then his mouth tightened a little and his eyes turned as cold as steel. It lasted a fraction of a second before being replaced by his usual phony smile, but it was enough for Jim to pick up the vibe that he wasn't very high on the judge's approval list. If it was because they had shared the same woman not more than two days ago, or because there was something in him that reminded Harvey of his father, Jim couldn't tell yet, but he felt keen to opt for the first. The only thing he felt he had in common with Dent Sr. was the mustache and that, frankly, didn't sound like enough to be hated for.

“Arnold Flass?” Dent said, and waited as his pronouncing the name was enough to get an answer.

“Yes?” Jim went along with practiced ease. He knew Harvey wasn’t long on patience. He could see the muscles of the judge's jaw clench as he waited for the answer, and Jim smiled inwardly. He wasn't going to march at the beat of Dent's drum, no matter how the other man needed for his own self esteem to top everyone around him.

“Are the charges on him solid enough to stick?” the judge felt compelled to add, annoyed.

“About his breaking and entering in Wayne's farm, his assault on Mr. Wayne and attempted murder of both Mr. Wayne and myself, I'd say they're more than solid,” Jim answered, resting his arms on the desk.

“What about Jack Napier's murder?” Harvey asked.   
“Barbara,” Jim thought, “isn't the only one who looks at Napier's death as a good opportunity to establish a winning public image.”

“At the moment nothing links directly Flass to the murder,” he reported, flatly.

“And Wayne?” Harvey insisted, flashing Jim a smile that held not one ounce of amity.

Jim drew a quick breath, in a manner that suggested his shirt was a little too tight in the chest, and chuckled bitterly at Dent. “ There isn't a single bit of evidence linking Mr. Wayne to the murder. His only fingerprints on the scene were on the telephone, and not one closer than 50 feet to the body. No blood on his clothes or his person, no motive to speak of...”

Dent's disappointment cracked his controlled expression like thin ice. Color rose into his face and his eyes narrowed, showing a hardness he wouldn’t have wanted the general public to see. He leaned a bit across the desk, lifting a finger in warning. “I know you've grown quite fond of the city boy, especially after what happened to your kids yesterday, but an officer of the law shouldn't entertain such a friendly relationship with a possible suspect,” he growled, the practiced tone of control gone.

“And I know how it would look on your resume, the trial of such a well known figure, judge.” Jim snapped, his temper rushing to the fore, ever ready to do battle for a just cause and damn the consequences. “But if we ignore the evidence, Flass was caught red-handed planting in his house yesterday, there is absolutely nothing, and I really mean nothing, to link Wayne with this murder.”

Harvey backed off, reeling in his temper, fighting to maintain a semblance of coolness.   
He didn’t like Jim Gordon and not just because he still had a strong bond with Barbara. He was a mean son of a bitch and was as tough as tungsten steel.  
Harvey would have gladly told the man to fuck off if it hadn’t been for the fact that he wasn't sure he could deal with the consequences.

“Look,” he said, switching back to a more diplomatic tone. “Nobody wants to frame anybody here. We're just concerned.”

A whoop of laughter burst out of Jim before he could even think to contain it. If that was not a pile of bullshit, nothing was. He suffocated the laugher to the point his eyes teared up for the effort.

“I'm sure it's just concern that motivates this visit. Even ignoring that this whole case is not 48 hours old yet, the county judge shouldn't be involved until the county prosecutor has a case to present, and to do that she needs to wait for us to build up said case. I'm sure Barbara has managed to explain it to you if you didn't know it already.”

A muscle twitched in Harvey's jaw, and his color heightened another notch, making him look as though his necktie was strangling him. He held himself rigid, fists clenching at his sides until he hid them in the pockets of his slacks.   
“I should have imagined that your hostility toward me was due to my relationship with Barbara,” he said tightly. “So let me tell you straight: It’s none of your business.”

Jim arched a brow. “Isn’t it? Seems to me that there's an evident conflict of interests if the only county judge and the only county prosecutor sleep together. Add to it that you're a married man and you get the picture. Until you two find a way to stop working together, or until you decide which woman you want to be with, you're both dangerously exposed. If you don't find a solution, you're going to sink like an anvil and you'll carry Barbara with you. In case you've forgotten, she's still the mother of my two kids and that makes it my business, judge.”

A wicked smile curled up one corner of Harvey mouth. “Who's gonna blow the whistle on us, sheriff, you? You just told me you still care about Barbara too much to hurt her intentionally, which makes us as safe as houses.”

“In Gotham? You must be joking... ” Jim said, his voice hoarse. “You can't throw a stone in the farthest corner of the county without having all the window panes of the town rattling. It won't stay buried.”

Harvey choked down his temper. “It will if you keep your mouth shut, and you will. Barbara and I are not the only ones with secrets.”

Jim wondered what kind of secret the judge and Barbara could hold against him. Since the only thing not in the open was his budding relationship with Bruce Wayne, which was just because it was so fresh that he wasn't even sure it was really budding. He couldn't imagine what else they could have on him. His months of psycho-analysis after he came back from the Balkans? Well, good luck with that. Flass had tried that card while they were running for sheriff, and the results were in front of everybody.   
Just to be sure, he asked nonetheless: “Are you threating me, judge?”

“It wouldn't be a smart thing to do, right sheriff?”

Jim couldn't help himself. “Whoever said you are smart?”

Harvey made a sound in his throat as he restrained himself from bolting out of the chair and jump at Jim's throat. “You know, you’ve got a real attitude problem, sheriff,” he said, pulling his hand out of his pocket to point a finger at Jim again.   
Rage shuddered just beneath the surface of his voice, and his features seemed to mold into a totally different face. Jim wondered if this second face was Harvey's real one. It seemed to fit him more properly than the public one. Nothing but meanness and petulance was in his eyes and the set of his mouth now.  
His gaze held Jim's just long enough to acknowledge the fact that the sheriff wasn't going to budge under the pressure of his angry stare. It was the same old story repeating itself since High school days, with Harvey always trying to prove something to the older, more liked one, to one-up him, to be richer, more important, more popular, and failing.   
He had seen Gordon as a rival from the get go and had never quite been able to let go of that high school mentality. When Jim had returned home at the end of his prolonged tour of duty, Harvey had picked up right where they’d left off. When he managed to be honest with himself, which wasn't often, Harvey used to go very close to admitting to himself that what led him to Barbara in the first place was the fact that she'd been Gordon's wife.

“It may be,” Jim answered Harvey's comment, baring his teeth. “It's quite common between veterans once suffering of post traumatic stress disorder...”   
He saw Harvey deflate in front of him and had to struggle to keep from grinning too widely. So his medical record was what Harvey was hinting about and he'd called the bluff in one sentence. “What a loser,” he thought and wondered what kind of appeal Barbara could have found in such a man.

“Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got an investigation to carry on,” Jim said flatly, pinching the bridge of his nose.

“Yeah, sure. Just keep me... Or better, just keep Barbara posted,” Harvey said, working up another of his phony grins and looking as smug as a kid who’d gotten out of detention.   
He wanted Jim to know that as long as he kept the prosecutor informed, he was going to be informed too.

“Right.” Jim shook his head and leaned back against the desk. “Just for the record, Harvey. I told Barbara and I'm telling you too. You're both consenting adults, so it's up to you to decide how to deal with Gilda.”   
Another strange flash passed through Harvey's eyes at the naming of his wife and some of the previous harshness reappeared. Jim had to admit with himself that the man in front of him really had two different faces, and one of them looked worryingly dangerous.

“But I won't let the two of you run the trial together,” Jim continued. “You have until the case is wrapped up to fix your working partnership with Barbara in a way or another...”

“You won't do this to Barbara.” Harvey said, backing out of the office and tossing Jim a look from over his shoulder. If possible, he looked even more smug.

“Try me, Harvey...” Jim muttered in the general direction of the receding form of the judge. “Just come and try me, you two-timing son of a bitch.”


	22. sketch of chapter 22

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the remaining parts of this story as they were planned

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm never going to finish writing this. I tried but writing seems to belong to the past.
> 
> in order to get a closure about this, I'm going to post the sketched chapters as I thought them and reveal who the murderer was and how things evolved between the sheriff and the city boy.
> 
> I'd be glad if someone feels like jumping in and novelize the remaining parts of the story and we can talk about it if you're interested

It didn't bother Bruce to see both the beaten warriors seated in the back of Alfred's Humvee, but he couldn't help wonder how a visit to the doctor fostered the reunion between the youngest of both Waynes and Gordons. He raised a questioning eyebrow in Alfred's direction but before the old man could answer Jimmy greeted Bruce with all the enthusiasm his condition allowed and explained that they all had met at the doctor's. His mom had received a call and had to run to the courthouse on an emergency and she'd asked Alfred if he minded looking over him too.  
Bruce looked at Alfred once again and he got his usual non committal shrug in answer. Evidently the old man didn't find anything out of place in being chosen as a temporary nanny by a perfect stranger in a doctor's office and he had no reason to find such a thing so uncharacteristic from the former Mrs. Gordon. Bruce, on the other hand, still remembered vividly the grilling he'd gone through the first time he'd spoken with Barbara Gordon about the kids so he didn't say anything, but kept wondering what kind of emergency could produce such a change of attitude in Jim's ex. Had Jim cracked the case already? He gave a cursory look around and decided it was too quiet for such an eventuality. There wasn't any of the signs of excitement that such a news could produce in a small place like Gotham. The town was still waiting for answers and minding its own business in the meanwhile.   
“Well, Jimmy. Welcome aboard Alfred's aircraft carrier.” he said with his best smile firmly in place to the blond kid who was still waiting for him to grant permission to stick around. “ It’s nice to see you. How are you doing today?”  
Jimmy smiled around the the contusions that still marred his face and that still matched perfectly those on Tim's. Why the kid thought that he could raise objections to him staying with them for the day, Bruce couldn't even start to imagine, but he noticed it immediately and felt relieved to see how both kids visibly relaxed after his amiable opening.  
“Fine, Mr. Wayne.” Jimmy lied whitely. From the way he moved gingerly it was blatantly obvious that he was still in considerable pain and that he was trying to show a stiff upper lip about it, for Tim or for the adults, Bruce couldn't tell.  
“I think it would be wise to take the young masters home and let them rest.” Alfred intervened with his usual aplomb. Both kids grinned for the formal tone and the title of masters bestowed to them.  
“Good idea. I think you should go already.” Bruce nodded, stopping in mid motion from jumping in the car and turning to clear the way.  
“How about your appointment with the principal, Bruce?” asked Alfred.  
“Don't worry. I'll walk. The principal isn't going won't call home if I'm a bit late.”  
“Nonsense. You can take the car and we can wait for you here in this picturesque Diner. I think our young masters could use with an iced tea and maybe a light sandwich.”

(those were the last lines written... from now on it's just the plot lines I planned then). 

Bruce goes to the school and find Dick studying with Babs Gordon in the library. They're getting along very well and Bruce can see that something nice is brewing there.  
The meeting with the principal turns into a proforma. Babs negotiated with him a day of suspension as some Saturday morning and extra curricular activity for both her and Dick. Snyder winds up praising both kids for their maturity and the whole discussion turns to the fate of Jason Todd.  
\---  
Bruce comes back to 'the breakfast' and introduce Alfred and the kids to the office and Dyno. needless to say, Jimmy and Tim fall in love with the T-rex instantly.   
Alfred doesn't even flinch at the view. he simply looks at Bruce and declare "It's a bold statement, young man. If you decide to keep it you must be sure you're ready to live up to such an expectation."  
And with that Dyno and the bat cave become part of the Wayne Household


	23. sketch of chapter 23

BCI is starting to get some results from the crime scenes, they're still inconclusive but they move the investigation forward.   
Flass' lawyer arrives but Stephens seems unable to make the deputy talk.  
Jim Gordon steps in and pushing all the right buttons manages to get Flass spill the beans even against his lawyer's advise.   
It winds up Flass knows about a cabal on unsuspected who had set up a gambling house on wheels that moves all around the county.   
Flass is in serious debt with the gambling house and has been blackmailed into breaking and entering into Bruce's house because of it.   
He can't say who the members of the cabal are, but he can vouch that Napier was the bigger brass .  
Jim thinks that finding the gambling house and uncover the cabal can help speed up the investigation since among them can be the motive of the homicide. 

A defeated Flass manages to drop his last bomb telling Jim to ask his ex wife what she knows about the cabal and if she's managed to even the losses of the last time she was at the gambling house.  
Jim calls Barbara and she admits she's been at the gambling house but she cannot tell where it is since it's by invitation only and she hasn't received any new invitation with the instructions to reach the place since her last time there, that was some months ago.  
She says she won so she's not indebted with the gambling house and add that no one of the crew or of the players was local so she can't help him find other members of the cabal. Jim has a hard time trying to believe her but can't do nothing more at the moment but set Bullock and Montoya on the case with the blessing of Stephens who thinks there is so much in his plate already without adding that.


	24. sketch of chapter 24

Bruce and Alfred are setting shop in the new office.  
Alfred finds the Bullock's plan for the Breakfast interesting and calls Oswald Cobblepot to talk business. The initial bad attitude of the banker disappears when a member of the board of the firm that controls part of the capital of the bank is summoned by Alfred via phone and drills the banker a new one. It also doesn't hurt that the member is Luciuss Fox and that Alfred has enough credit to out buy Cobblepot out of his bank if he feels like it.

In the end the Wayne-Pennyworth will buy the whole building from Carver and sell the whole first floor of it to the Bullocks to expand 'the Breakfast' (but only the details will be sketched here. The whole transaction will happen off screen after the end of this story and the beginning of the probable sequel).

Out of the bank Bruce meets Helena Bertinelli (the social worker).  
She asks him to step in and help her find a home for Jason Todd.  
Initially Bruce makes a lot of protests about it (how can I look over someone who has beaten one of my charges and has been beaten by the other one... and weren't you suspicious of my 'all boys club' just some days ago?) but in the end he promises her to talk with the kid and see if something can be done.  
Helena fixes a meeting for later in the afternoon.


	25. sketch to chapter 25

IT starts with Jim learning the news about Bruce Wayne and the Bat Cave and consequentially going upstairs to pay a visit   
There he finds a very cozy and cute scene, with Alfred and Bruce working at the big main console,speaking in low voices, and Tim and Jimmy sleeping on the couch at the end of Dyno. The two kids are not exactly cuddling, but they're side by side, shoulder to shoulder and with their head sort of supporting each other.  
Jim can't help but take a picture of them with his cell phone and wind up comparing with the pictures taken by both Bruce and Alfred of the same subject.

meanwhile Babs and Dick are walking home from the library and Dick is 'talking', really talking to Babs about how he feels about everything. He winds up admitting he talked more with her in a single day than with the shrink in 4 years. he also admits it feels really good.  
When they arrive at the breakfast and are led to the second floor they meet Dyno. Dick's new relaxed attitude surprises Bruce and Alfred. Bruce and Jim's friendliness surprise the kids. The camera inside Dyno eye shoot and immortalize a moment with all the Wayne/Gordon clan together in a single place and it's perfect.  
Then the cell phone in Jim's pocket starts to ring. It's Bullock with a lead on the cabal. Babs goes away with Jimmy. Alfred, Dick and Tim goes home too. Bruce stays back to speak with Hollie Quinn about The new Wayne/Pennyworth venture.  
The perfect moment is gone but for the picture remained in the screen behind Bruce, but while jokingly bantering and name calling with Quinn, Bruce keeps looking at it and imagine the same picture of all of them taken in the same place ten years from that moment... And smiles...


	26. sketch of chapter 26

Harvey Bullock and Renee Montoya meet Jim in a dismissed factory on the far edge of the county. The Place is empty but it looks like it was recently used and dismantled in a rush. It may be where the cabal hid the gambling house on wheels. Ransacking the premises, they find Harley Quinzell Driving License.   
Jim has to send Bullock and Montoya to pick her up because he is summoned back at the office by Stephens who has found a fingerprint on the paper of the latter used to frame Flass.  
By the time Jim arrives, Stephens has the identity of the owner of the fingerprint:it's a clerk of Gotham's tribunal.  
Apparently it's a dead end. The clerk works the xerox machine and his fingerprints are on lots and lots of paper. BCI does a deep check on him but nothing seems to connect him with Flass or Napier or the cabal. He's just a Joe somebody working nine to five in the tribunal and the rest of his time in the fields as a hired hand.  
Nonetheless Gerry Stephens is convinced that Flass' blackmailer (and consequentially the one who wanted to frame Bruce Wayne) may be someone inside the courthouse.   
Harvey and Renee find Harley Quinzell full to the brim of Sleeping pills, barely alive. They manage to get her to the hospital and get her stomach pumped out but it may be too late...


End file.
